Paradoxical
by Comprehensible
Summary: This is an AU in which Sans messes up the battle with Chara, and is consequently banished from the timeline. Gender neutral Chara and Frisk, rated T for some violence. There is an OC, but there will be no romance between Sans and the OC. Warning, Genocide run spoilers. Enjoy! (Formerly GLASSTALE)
1. Chapter 1

**Hiya! This is my first "actual" story, so I'm hoping for some feedback. Cover image by Eliocelot13. Check out her profile on QuoteV! Huge thanks to luigi207 for fixing my Morse code!  
**

* * *

"it's a beautiful day outside. birds are singing, flowers are blooming. on days like this, kids like you..."

Frisk stood shrouded in darkness, even though the room was illuminated with a soft golden light. They didn't look good. Dust stained their small hands, one of which was clutching a razor sharp knife. A smile stretched across their face, which was almost identical to the smile Sans wore himself. However, neither of their grins contained any mercy. The two of them stood glaring down at the other. Pure blue eye met bloody red eyes. One set of eyes would never see the light of day again.

" **. . . .** "

Sans summoned his full arsenal and hurled it at the demon across from him. A gaster blaster clipped Frisk's SOUL, and they winced. A look of pure malice crossed their face.

"I killed the lady behind the door. She was so nice, wasn't she?" A menacing whisper emerged from the seemingly innocent child.

"I killed the captain of the royal guard. That idiot refused to die." Frisk's voice suddenly increased in intensity.

"I killed your brother, Sans. He was so pathetic!" Frisk's - no, Chara's perverted grin seemed to stretch even wider.

"Guess who's next, Sansy-pansy? You! How fun! Will you put up a better fight than the ones you love?" Chara giggled, and Sans inwardly grimaced. Kids like them were supposed to be playing with toys and watching cartoons, not killing like a genocidal maniac. However, Sans wasn't listening to Chara. He was watching to see where they would strike next. Chara leaped forward, with their knife aimed directly at Sans's heart. Sans dodged easily.

"did you think i would just stand there and take it?" He chuckled mirthlessly before launching another barrage of bones. Chara swerved crazily to avoid his attacks, almost crashing into several gilded pillars.

"anomalies have been occurring in the time space continuum," Sans began.

"timelines jumping left and right," Sans suddenly felt a sense of deja vu. Had he done this before?

"this is your doing, isn't it?" Sans continued, his hoarse voice barely a whisper. He felt a presence looming behind him.

"Oh yes, Sans. It is. And always will be." The presence behind Sans was shuffling closer, its foul breath pervading the air.

"And to help me, I brought my little friend. Look behind you!" Sans turned around slowly and carefully, expecting the very worst.

Nothing was there.

"Kid..." Sans growled.

"Whoops!" Chara giggled.

"You turned around and messed up the battle sequence! How terrible!" Chara put an and exaggerated look of distress. Sans honestly had no idea what they were talking about.

"It looks like we need to fix the game, don't we Sans?"

Game. Sans had many theories about the odd resets, but the whole world being a game was a new one. However, he did know one thing. Monsters who didn't follow the script simply disappeared. Monsters like Gaster.

"You little-" Sans's voice gave out as a small white dog appeared in front of him. Sans's eyes widened.

"Sans, you have disobeyed the program. You have committed a fault of the highest order!" A huge voice bellowed out of the seemingly tiny dog.

"You shall be banished from this world as atonement for your transgressions!" Sans felt a powerful force push him to his knees as his arms were tightly bound behind him with a cyan magic. Sans struggled, but to no avail. He had actually seen a banishment before, and afterwards had hoped with all his SOUL that he would never be banished. Would he be erased from everyone's minds too? What would happen to Papyrus? Would he forget him too? Sans unconsciously eyed the old red scarf looped around his neck. He closed his eyes. He was not ready to leave this world, yet when was he ever ready? Darkness began to swirl around him, a sharp painful void that cut down his HP astonishingly quickly.

1 HP

0.1 HP

0.01 HP

0.001 HP

0.0001 HP

0.00001 HP

0.000001 HP

0.0000001 HP

0.00000001 HP

0.000000001 HP

0.0000000001 HP

...

-.. .- .-. -.- / -.. .- .-. -.- . .-. / -.- . - / -.. .- .-. -.- . .-.


	2. Chapter 2

**Hiya! I don't own UNDERTALE. Enjoy!**

* * *

"Mari! Come here please!"

Mari smiled. Professor Celeriac was so sweet. Professor Celeriac was like a grandmother to Mari. Professor Celeriac had even brought in homemade sugar cookies once. Mari had nibbled one politely, even though the professor had put salt instead of sugar in them. Mari stood up from where she was sitting at her spotless desk and walked over to Celeriac's office, which was right down the hall from Mari's desk. Mari peeked into the office, which was in its usual state of organized chaos. Papers were scattered everywhere, and the walls were completely covered in old whiteboards, which had unintelligible mathematical scribbles scrawled all over them. Flimsy fluorescent lights lit the room. Professor Celeriac was hunched over her desk, on which was a laptop from at least the Stone Age.

"Hey, Professor. What do you need me for?" Mari asked helpfully.

"Hello, Mari. Would you be a dear and help me run an experiment?"

"Sure! Leave it to me." Experiments were often fun, but sometimes they ended disastrously. Celeriac didn't really follow strict safety standards, but then again, no one paid any attention to her dusty old area of the building. Mari's ears picked up a muffled ringtone from underneath a stack of papers. Mari dug around for a few seconds. She picked up the phone and glanced at its screen.

"Professor, your son is calling."

"Hmmm? Son? I have a son?" Mari sighed. It was hard to believe this woman was a genius quantum physicist, and the best in her field.

"Never mind. Just call him later, okay?" Mari chided. Professor Celeriac didn't respond. Mari doubted the aging professor would remember to call.

Mari's eyes then fell on a big piece of machinery wedged in the corner of the room.

"Hey Celeriac, what's this?" Mari gestured to the large machine."

"It's an trans-dimensional extractor! It works like this..." Professor Celeriac then proceeded to spew technical gibberish, at least to Mari's uneducated ears.

"Woah, woah! Slow down! I'm just a secretary, remember?" Mari laughed.

"Sorry. In layman's terms, this is The Error Machine. In theory, it will isolate a timeline that is reaching its ending, and rescue citizens of the timeline left alive; warping them here," Professor Celeriac explained.

"Cool! Like, will it summon an ET?" Mari exclaimed in wonder.

"Yes, if it works." Professor Celeriac chuckled. Mari looked at the machine. The complexity of it amazed her. It looked a little like an oversized toaster. It was roughly the size of a table, with wires running everywhere.

"Hey, why don't we just call it the Error Toaster?" Mari suggested, while grinning from ear to ear.

Sans was in agony. It wasn't just that he felt like someone had dragged a whip across every surface on his body. It was mostly that his SOUL was already breaking down in the desolate void around him. What would happen after Chara reset the world? Who would protect Papyrus from her? Would Papyrus even remember him? Sans sobbed silently. He couldn't move, and he couldn't cry out. The judgement hall had long since faded away. The darkness around him seemed perpetual, and he had no hope for a future. What was there to live for?

"Sans," Two floating hands that seemed to have holes in their palms signed. Sans's eyes widened at the hand's sudden appearance.

"Gaster?" Sans signed out feebly. Even moving his hand made him wince. Was he hallucinating? Or was this just another sick joke played on him by his mind?

"Sans. We do not have much time," A mask like face came into being. Sans immediately recognized it as Gaster. Gaster's face was still frozen into his twisted grin, but his eyes seemed much gentler then Sans had ever seen them.

"I am giving you a new form, Sans. One that will fit the place of your place of banishment." Sans was filled with terror as he felt flesh growing on his bones and hair sprouted on his head. His vision faded out for a moment as eyes grew in. It was not painful, yet gaining so much mass at once is never pleasant. To add to the burden, many unanswered questions spun in Sans's mind. However, he was physically unable to ask them, as his hands seemed to freeze.

"Goodbye, Sans. It was nice seeing you again," Gaster signed with an air of finality. The dark void around him grew as bright as diamonds, and Gaster seemed to dissolve into the light. As the void disappeared around him, Sans swore he heard a soft voice whisper three gentle words:

 _Lorem et ipsum_


	3. Chapter 3

Mari was extremely bored. Eight hours had passed since the Professor had activated the machine, and no ET had shown up. The professor sat at her desk to Mari's right, and was busy solving Junior Jumble section of the newspaper. However, she seemed to be having some trouble.

"Mari, would you please remind me what C, T, and A unscramble to?" Professor Celeriac asked.

"Cat," Mari replied, with a touch of irritation. At least a no show of an ET was better than what happened last time Celeriac had tested a new machine. Celeriac's machine had belched smoke everywhere and then, to add injury to insult, exploded. It took Mari three days to clean the soot from the office. Three days!

"Ummm... Professor?" Mari mumbled. A lump formed in her throat.

"Yes, Mari?" Celeriac responded.

"You know," Mari paused. She really did not want to say this, but Celeriac sometimes lost track of reality.

"Maybe our ET isn't showing up?" Mari swallowed.

"Nonsense! Ten more minutes!" The professor enthused. Mari inwardly sighed. The professor had been saying that for the last eight hours, and Mari was fed up. She felt anger begin to boil over, like a column of flame. _No, no, NO! I can't get like this again!_ Mari thought. However, words were already spilling from her lips.

"You know what?! Frack this ship!" Mari began to storm out of Celeriac's office.

"Frack this job, frack this office, and frack you!" She snarled at Celeriac. Mari had enough. She wouldn't have to take care of a loony professor who didn't know cat from dog. She would not have to come home at three AM because Celeriac wanted to run "just one more" test. And best of all, no more waiting for a child's tale to come out of a fracking toaster! She sprinted out of the office, to her desk. She was stuffing her belongings into her backpack when she heard Celeriac say something.

"Mari! The machine!" The professor yelled after her. Mari stopped dead in her tracks, stupefied.

"The machine?" Mari's mind froze.

"Yes! It's working!"

Mari stood up in a flash, and ran into Celeriac's office. The error toaster, as Mari had dubbed it earlier, was glowing with a blinding cyan light. A deafening tolling sound filled the room. Was it a clock tower? There was no clock towers in the area. The Professor was in the corner, typing furiously on the machine's monitor.

"Mari! I'm going to be busy working the machine's controls! Would you make first contact with whatever comes in?!" Mari's eyes widened.

"Me?!" She sputtered.

"I'm a bit busy right now!" Celeriac yelled as she typed in commands furiously on the computer controlling the error toaster.

"Mari, I'm going to kill the program. This is getting out of control!" Celeriac frowned. Just then, Mari's phone rang in her pocket, and she instinctively answered it.

"Hello?" She asked.

"This is Rose Celeriac's son. Is Rose busy right now?" Mari wondered if he could have called at a worse time. It hardly seemed possible!

"Um, she's a bit busy right now." Well, that was a massive understatement.

"May I call you back?" Mari half pleaded, half whimpered.

"Sure. I'm sorry. She's just... always busy, I guess," Celeriac's son sighed. Mari took the opportunity to hang up. She really was becoming more like Celeriac.

Mari advanced towards the error toaster. Gale force wind seemed to suddenly come out from some unknown source, scattering papers all over and throwing Mari back violently. The light coming from the machine seemed to pooling in one spot. Which was, Mari noticed with some apprehension, a roughly human sized spot.

"Frack!" Mari bit her lip as a flying pen nearly impaled her.

"Professor! Turn it off!" Mari pleaded.

"I'm trying Mari! Thirty more seconds until I can kill the program!" The professor cried back. Mari felt herself being blown back by the sheer force of the wind. The gale, a demon raging against it fragile cage, hurled sharp tendrils of paper at Mari, missing her by millimeters.

" **Which idiot is messing with time and space!** " A high pitched voice screeched out of the blizzard made by papers. Mari covered her ears, wincing in pain from the sheer volume of the voice.

"How much more time until you can shit it off?!" She shouted desperately at Celeriac.

"Ten seconds!" Celeriac yelled over the roaring din. Mari started counting down in head.

Ten...

A great pair of claws seemed to emerge from error toaster. Mari couldn't quite make them out in the paper blizzard, but they looked sharp enough to skin a sheep.

Nine...

Arms followed the claws. They were gigantic, and seemed to be made of something very spiky.

Eight...

What Mari had mistaken for arms were... vines?

Seven...

The abomination dragged its full form out. It seemed to be a TV screen with a pixelated face, supported by monstrous thorny vines and surrounded by an odd mess of tangled wires. (It's Omega Flowey if you haven't picked it up by now.)

Six...

" **In this world, it's kill or be killed!** " The entity coming from Celeriac's machine screeched. Its voice was an odd combination of a child's lullaby and ten thousand rusty chainsaws. Mari flinched back from the pure hatred she felt emanating from that one phrase.

Five...

Something came over Mari.

"Why are you doing this? You have good in you!" She cried out. Mari was terrified after listening to the beast's words, but all she could hear was its suffering. The thing coming from the machine ignored her.

Four...

*Mari called for help.

Three...

*But nobody came.

Two...

A vine extended itself towards Mari, like gleaming scythe. Mari knew it was the end.

One...

The vine curled back, preparing one decisive blow to end her life. Her pathetic, useless life.

Zero...

The vine sped towards Mari, traveling a million miles per hour. Mari was petrified, like a rabbit staring the down the end of a hunter's rifle.

"I shut down the program, Mari!" The professor exclaimed, breathing a sigh of relief. Mari stared down at her now bloody hands. Panic formed in her gut. There was so much blood.

It wasn't her blood.

* * *

 **Hiya! I realized that I really took a 180 degree turn with chapter 2. Sorry. Also, because there has been so much OC in this chapter, the next chapter will only be Sans. I promise. I'm gonna try to update on Sundays. Oh, and also, Mari's name is not pronounced like Mary. The a sounds like an aah sound. Thanks for reading, and have a nice day! :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**There is mentions of injuries and some gun violence in this chapter, so if you don't want to see that, skip this chapter.**

* * *

Sans never wanted to go into that time-space intersection again. Not if he could a **void** it. He chuckled darkly to himself at his mental pun. Sans was lying flat on his back, in what appeared to be an office. It looked like a F5 tornado had torn through it. Furniture was thrown everywhere like a giant toddler had picked up the whole room and thrown it. In the corner lay a smoldering machine that resembled... a toaster? _weird. i wonder what happened?_ Sans thought.

"Okay, stay calm. We'll get you help." Sans noticed a girl kneeling at his side, looking panicked.

"help for what?" Sans slurred.

"J-just relax." She stuttered.

"Okay, I'm going to apply pressure to your wound. This won't hurt a bit," She said. Wound? Oh yeah. Sans had jumped in front of the girl when the glitched Flowey had tried to kill her. Why had he done that? That was a terrible idea! Sans gave a small gasp as pressure was applied to the gash in his arm, and the searing pain forced all of his thoughts out of his head.

"hey, did you hear about the guy who lost his left side?" Sans manned his final defenses against reality: humor.

"No, what about it?" The girl replied.

"he's **all right** now." The girl smiled, but the worry didn't leave her eyes.

"Here," She said. Sans felt as the girl laid a coat across him. _i'm no doctor, but blankets are usually used to treat shock. my condition must be pretty bad_. Sans thought. He still couldn't steel himself to look at the gaping wound he felt burning on his arm.

"Celeriac, please call 911." The girl calmly intoned. She seemed to have recovered from the initial shock of seeing Sans. However, her eyes said otherwise.

"G-got it. What s-should I tell them?" An older human cowering in the corner stammered. How did he not notice her before?

"I don't care. Just get help," The younger one replied forcefully.

"heh. i'd say this whole operation is in **vein** ," Sans joked feebly.

"Don't talk. We're getting you help." The girl seemed to be blurring into the office as she spoke. Sans heard some sort of blaring siren in the distance. It hurt his ears.

"is it okay if I go to sleep now?" Sans felt his eyes growing heavy. He had not caught one wink of sleep in the void.

"Yes." The girl consoled softly. Sans drifted slowly into unconsciousness.

* * *

Sans awoke in a drug-induced haze. He was lying in a crisp white hospital bed. The room was dim, but light poured in from a crack underneath the door. Two people were arguing in the hallway outside his small room.

"What are we going to tell the authorities? Oh, the kid was summoned from a magical toaster along with an evil vine demon robot, but the vine demon robot was sucked back into the magical toaster. We're also not crazy. No sir, not one bit." The older voice rambled, clearly stressed. Celeriac, was it?

"Celeriac, calm down. The kid is safe. We can talk to him and make up a reasonable story later," The younger voice tried to reason with Celeriac.

"Mari, we're both fracked." Silence rang out after Celeriac's statement, as loud as any gunshot. Sans grimaced. He clearly wasn't welcome here. With a small pop, Sans teleported away.

* * *

Sans appeared on a grimy street. Dim streetlights projected their bright shadows on the lonely road. It was pouring rain, and large puddles filled the gaping maws of potholes on the street. _huh. this must be the surface_. Sans thought. He was wearing a thin paper hospital gown, and bandages wrapped his right arm. Sans quickly ducked into a darkened alleyway. Too many people could potentially see him on the open street. Two dumpsters were pushed against a brick wall in the alley, which was slathered with faded graffiti. With a sigh, Sans started rooting through the first dumpster. He'd hoped he would never have to root through trash again. It must have been his lucky day, because someone had thrown out a stained white tee shirt, a pair of black shorts, and a purple zipper down hoodie. _nice_. He thought appreciatively. He quickly ducked behind a dumpster and changed out of the flimsy gown. He then turned to walk out of the alleyway. His stomach growled. Maybe he could find some food next.

"Kid, whatcha doin' down here? This ain't a playground!"

Sans turned around to see who was speaking, but felt something cold poke the back of his head.

"Kid, Imma have to shoot ya if you turn 'round."

"please don't." Sans squeaked out. Was it just him, or did his voice sound higher than his voice in the underground? Either way, it was best just to play the role of the scared child for now.

"Give me your money."

Money? Did he mean gold?

"i-i don't have any," Sans stuttered. He didn't want to hurt the man. Besides, if he teleported away, the man would certainly report him as some sort of alien. Sans would then be hunted down like an animal by whatever government was up here.

"You don't have any? That hoodie looks expensive, kid. I ain't gettin' oke doked!" The man growled.

"i found it in a d-dumpster, honestly." Sans whispered.

"Then you won't mind me gettin' rid of the evidence." Sans felt the gun press up against his head. His bones - er, blood froze.

"Bye, kid." The man whispered.

Sans heard glass shatter around him.

* * *

 **I think I'm just going to alternate POVs. Like, between Mari and Sans. If any of you can guess which city this is set in, I will be VERY impressed. Yes, it is set in a real city. Hope you enjoyed the chapter! :)**


	5. Chapter 5

Mari stood at the head of the dark alleyway. She was brandishing a broken beer bottle, which she had smashed against the wall seconds earlier.

"Hey! Leave the kid alone!" Mari shouted.

"M-miss Mari! Of c-course! I-I didn't realize he was under your protection!" the man stuttered, backing away.

"Leave. Now!" Mari snarled. The man glanced around, hesitating. "Or will I have to give you a bad time?" The man whimpered and sprinted out of the alleyway. _That's lunatics for you._ Mari thought. _They'll bark while they can, but once they meet a bigger dog, they run tail between legs._

"Sorry about that. Would you please come down by my apartment? We can work out what to do there." She said to the scared looking kid the man was about to kill seconds earlier. He nodded hesitantly. Did he really have any better options?

Mari guided the kid to her apartment. Luckily, it was only a block away from the alley that he was attacked in. She sat him down on her comfy couch. Mari's living room was extremely messy; socks and books were strewn everywhere. Mari hadn't been expecting visitors.

"I'm making hot cocoa. Do you want some?" She asked. The kid was soaked and shivering. A hot drink would hopefully warm him up.

"sure." The kid replied, his eyes vacant. Mari observed him, as she had been a bit too panicked to look at him earlier. He was an extremely short African American child. He looked like he could be twelve years old to sixteen years old. He had messy black hair, but his eyes were his most striking features. His left eye was a vibrant cerulean, which seemed to glow a bright gold in bright light. His right eye was more normal, but had an imperceptible crimson glow, which was only visible in shadow. It gave the illusion that he was looking at more than just Mari. He was smiling, but his smile seemed… empty, for lack of a better word.

"are you done staring?" The kid asked, clearly annoyed.

"Oh! Sorry," Mari squeaked, and quickly scurried into the kitchen. She prepared the hot cocoa with practiced speed, and returned to the messy living room. She then handed the kid a cup of the steaming chocolatey goodness. Mari swore, hot chocolate was a gift from a divine entity, if there were any. He took a sip, and his eyes lit up.

"this is good!" He started to guzzle his hot cocoa very quickly.

"Whoa, slow down! You're going to get a brain melt!" Mari laughed. "Have you even had hot cocoa before?" Mari continued.

"nope. though i drink so much coffee, I consider it part of my daily grind." The kid answered with a slight smirk and a wink. Mari groaned at the bad pun.

"Okay, question time. What is your name?" Mari asked.

"sans."

"Okay, Sans. How did you leave the hospital without anyone seeing you? As far as the security cameras are concerned, you were in the hospital, and then disappeared. How did you leave?"

"magic," Sans replied. Mari sighed. She half wished Sans was delirious again. It would be much easier to ask him questions; he was much chattier wounded.

"Do you have a home currently?"

"nope. it's gone."

"Do you have any family or friends I would be able to contact?"

"nope. they're all dead."

"Would we be able to return you to your world?"

"maybe. it probably was erased by chara."

"Chara?"

"i don't want to talk about it." Sans's fake smile fell. That made sense. Celeriac said that the error toaster pulled beings from destroyed timelines. Mari doubted that timelines just ended themselves. It probably wasn't a pleasant experience, either. Also, if the authorities found Sans, many unanswerable questions would come up.

"Okay Sans, here is what I think we should do. Given that you're not from this world, I believe you should lay low for now. You may stay at my house for as long as you need. I'll tell Celeriac you're here, but I won't let her kick you out. Does that sound okay?" It was the only reasonable idea Mari had, considering the alternative was reporting Sans to the government.

"how do i know you won't betray me?" Sans asked miserably. Sans's eyes briefly clouded with tears, but he composed himself quickly.

"Do you have any better options?" Mari whispered. Sans seemed to mull over his options for a couple interminable minutes, during which neither of them moved a muscle.

"great. Where do i find the ketchup?" Sans answered. Mari smiled. It seemed her ET was here to stay.

"one question!" Sans hastily added.

"Yes?" Mari replied.

"why was the lunatic with the gun so terrified of you? all you had was a broken bottle." Sans inquired.

"Magic." Mari replied, with her best devilish grin.

"i guess it would be boring if i knew everything about you." Sans grinned back.

* * *

 **Hiya! Comprehensible here. This is a short chapter, I know. Sorry. Yes NoName (Guest), it is set in North America. CupkakeGalore, thanks! I gave a description of Sans for you. :) The next chapter will be fluff. If you don't like fluff, just wait for the next one to come out. Thanks for reading! It really makes me happy to see so many people reading my work!  
**


	6. Chapter 6

"is there anything good on tv right now, Mari?" Sans asked sleepily, his limbs splayed across Mari's comfortable couch. Mari was nestled next to him wearing a chick yellow onesie with dinosaurs chasing butterflies on it.

"Unless you want to watch Attack of the Flying Mutant Zombie Robot Ninja Gorillas for a tenth time, no." Mari responded sleepily, and she yawned. It was around three AM in the morning, but neither of them wanted to sleep. Sans sighed for what must have been the hundredth time.

"couldn't we drop by celeriac's lab?" Sans suggested. "she's always up."

"What if something bad happened, and you ended up hopelessly lost, or mugged like last time?" Mari fretted. _Jeez_. Sans thought. _She really is a worrier_. _Besides, I can take care of myself_. Mari's cracked phone rang. Sans mentally applauded her nyan cat ringtone. She motioned for Sans to turn down the TV, and answered the phone.

"Hello? Who is this?" Mari asked. Sans could not make out the caller's words, but the caller sounded extremely nervous. Mari's face blanched in response.

"I'll come as fast as I can," She responded, and hung up.

"Sans, grab a pair of sunglasses. The sunglasses are on the kitchen table. I have to go. Is it okay if Celeriac watches you for a while?" Mari rushed to collect her coat without waiting for a response. Sans groggily stood up from the couch and stretched.

"guess what, mari?" Sans felt a grin creeping over his face.

"What?" Mari responded curtly.

"i once knew a man in the sunglasses business. he was pretty shady." Mari laughed, but it sounded forced. Sans was now officially worried about her. Usually she lit up like a Christmas tree at one of his puns. Mari put her coat on, and wrapped a frayed crimson scarf around her neck.

"Come on, let's go." Mari walked briskly out of the apartment, dragging Sans by his violet hoodie with her.

"jeez crazy lady, i'm coming!" Sans yelled as Mari started down the stairs. He had to keep up with her to avoid being suffocated by his hoodie.

"Hurry up, slowpoke!" Mari yelled to Sans as she sprinted outside. It was extremely dark outside, but the streetlights cast a dim glow bright enough to see by. Sans quickly followed Mari down the sidewalk.

"are we taking the L?" Sans asked, wringing his hands like Alphys used to. The L was the local train system, also known to Sans as panic attack city.

"Yeah. Why?" Mari asked, still dragging Sans.

"oh my gosh. i'm going to be a train wreck." Sans agonized. He hated the L with a passion. Sans had only been on a train once, but he had almost broken down sobbing in front of everyone on the train.

"You can do it," Mari said dismissively. "You can close your eyes if you need to."

"big help," Sans mumbled. Mari could not understand his fear of train tunnels. He had even looked it up the name of it the other day. It was called agoraphobia*. Mari would never have to be trapped under an enormous hunk of rock for decades with a manipulating psychopath. She would never feel the jagged walls of a small cave closing in around her, creeping hands that had excruciatingly crushed away all his hope. She would never have to watch her brother, her only reason to exist, perish over and over again before her eyes, like some perverted** movie scene she could not stop, nor hope to flee from.

"Sans?" Mari asked, looking confused. Sans snapped out of his reverie.

"what?"

"You're crying."

"huh?" Sans felt sticky tears streaming down his face. He hadn't noticed that he was crying before.

"when did i... when did i start crying?" Sans asked no one in particular. Sans could not stop the downpour of tears trickling down his cheeks. The burning tears blurred his vision, until all he could see was the splotch of crimson that was Mari's scarf. That scarf was oddly familiar. Who else wore a scarf like that?

"papy?" Sans whispered.

Papyrus. Oh tem, what had happened to him?

"papy?" Sans whispered from behind a skeletal tree. It was lightly snowing. Sans's light blue hoodie protected him from the worst of the cold, but the cold still nipped at his hands. _Not again! This can't be happening!_ Sans thought, panicking. He tried to flee, but his feet felt rooted to the ground like invisible tendrils had ensnared them. Papyrus stood on the path ahead, completely unaware that Sans was watching him. A small child shambled towards Papyrus with a malevolent grin affixed across their face. They wore a pair of scarlet boxing gloves, however, an ashy grey substance dulled the bright color.

"I, PAPYRUS, WELCOME YOU WITH OPEN ARMS!" Papyrus said with his arms outstretched, as if to hug the demon.

"papyrus! don't spare them! they'll kill you!" Sans tried to yell, but his voice stuck in his throat. The small human stepped forward to give Papyrus a hug. Would they spare his brother? The child suddenly froze, as if pulled by an invisible force.

"I am far beyond forgiveness." The child whispered, but their face was streaked with tears. Sans's eyes widened. The child attacked Papyrus once.

How many punches does it take to kill a brother?

One.

"ST- STILL... I BELIVE IN YOU!" The force holding Sans's ankles down released. Sans tried to sprint to his brother's side, but tripped. Papyrus was uttering the lines Sans had heard far too many times.

"YOU CAN DO A LITTLE BETTER, EVEN IF YOU DON'T THINK SO!" Sans watched as his brother's bones crumbled into dust. Seconds later, only Papyrus's head remained in the snow.

"I-I... PROMISE..." Papyrus's final words rang out just as Sans reached him. Papyrus's head disintegrated into dust. Sans's brother was dead yet again.

"papyrus!" Sans choked out. "n-no... this can't be happening! not again!" He fell to his knees in front of the pile of dust that was his brother just seconds ago. Sans looked up to see the child who had taken everything he loved away from him. They loomed above him, and all Sans felt was a deep, white hot hatred.

" ." Sans felt his eyes darken to pitch black. The child who had murdered his brother was going to have a very bad time.

"Sans, you're safe. Don't worry." A familiar voice came out of the child. It sounded much more mature than what their voice had sounded like earlier.

"Sans, look at me. We're safe." The snowy scene faded away. Mari was kneeling in front of Sans with a concerned look on her face.

"Would you please tell me where we are?" Mari asked softly.

"mc-mcclurg street. we're right by your apartment." Sans whispered. The swirling snow had faded away, leaving Sans back on the grimy city street. _Thank goodness no one was awake to see that_. Sans thought with a feeling of relief.

"You have episodes?" Mari asked with a slight frown.

"yeah. sorry." Sans realized he had broken down in the middle of the sidewalk.

"You don't need to apologize. Let's go back inside. You look exhausted." Mari extended a hand to help Sans up. _Darn right I'm tired_. Sans thought. He had not slept in the three days he was staying at Mari's apartment. Nightmares had plagued him for his whole life, and his nightmares had only intensified with his passing through the void.

"scarf." Sans breathed.

"What about my scarf?" Mari looked confused, and pointed to the scarlet scarf she was wearing.

"may i have your scarf?" Sans asked softy.

"Sure, if it calms you down," Mari replied, puzzled. She handed the tattered scarf to Sans, who immediately wrapped it around his neck. Sans gave her a tired smile. Mari guided Sans back to her apartment. He fell into a deep sleep as soon as he climbed into his bed. No nightmares bothered him that night.

* * *

*Agoraphobia: The fear of places and situations that might cause panic, helplessness, embarrassment, or the feeling of ensnarement.

**Perverted does not mean sexually wrong in this case. Perverted: (of a thing) having been corrupted or distorted from its original course, meaning, or state.

* * *

 **Hiya! Comprehensible speaking. This is all just fluff. I love fluff. Anyways, there will be actual plot development next chapter! KHR-Yunalesca, thanks for pointing that out! Maybe Sans's scarf got lost in the void? Anyways, have a nice day, and please don't get eaten by rabid kittens until the next chapter comes out!**


	7. Chapter 7

_Who knew it would be so easy to give Sans the slip?_ Mari thought gleefully. The sleeping drug she had sprinkled on her crimson scarf had really worked its magic on Sans. Mari was now waiting in a chilly train station at three AM. She was wearing a faded grey coat over her dandelion yellow onesie. A chilly wind nipped at her exposed skin, but she did not seem to mind.  
"The maroon line is arriving now. Please stand behind the yellow line until the train comes to a complete stop before boarding." An autonomous voice recited blandly. Mari felt a strong gust of wind blow past her as a train rushed into the station. When Mari looked inside the train, it was deserted, given the time of day and the neighborhood. Mari stepped in and took a seat in the empty train car.

"The doors are now closing. Please stand clear of the doors." The train's programmed voice recited along with two chimes. The train started to speed along, rumbling its displeasure at being forced to move. Mari took out her beaten up phone and started playing Geometry Dash. A couple of minutes later, the train screeched to a stop. The doors slid open, and an acquaintance of Mari's shambled in.  
"Mari!" Her acquaintance slurred. He was swaying like a boat in stormy weather. Mari could smell the vodka on him from three feet away.  
"Hello, Sprog," Mari replied, wrinkling her nose. Sprog was an alcoholic, and he lived on the other side of town. He often frequented Mari's neighborhood, but he worked for some big company. No one knew his real name. Currently, the neighborhood was offering a fifty-dollar reward for anyone who correctly guessed his name.  
"So I was down by a bar a week ago, and I ran into the loveliest lady!" Sprog garbled, hugging a metal pole.  
"What happened?" Mari asked, absorbed in her game.  
"It turned out that she was part of this murder case. I ratted her out," Sprog said, and he started sobbing hysterically.  
"You made the right choice. She killed someone, Sprog." Mari tried to console him.  
"I'll never see her again! I loved her, and now she's gone!" Sprog cried with a wail of anguish. _If I do this, Sans will be gone too._ Mari thought guiltily. _What will happen to him?_  
"Approaching Grand Street station. The white line transfers here." The train's trapped voice recited. Mari quickly stood up with a feeling of relief.  
"It has been nice talking to you, Sprog," Mari lied with her best fake smile. She hurried out of the train car without waiting for a response.

Mari tramped up the steps leading to Grand street from the train platform. Grand street was hardly grand by any stretch of the imagination. The road was a spider web of cracks, and dejected butter cups lined the edges of the road. The space besides the road was dominated by a lifeless, box like complex with barbed wire fences around it. Mari walked towards the stormy complex. She held up her ID to a scanner, and with a beep, it let her through. Mari was then allowed to advance forward. She glanced up. A sign over a set of imposing glass front doors read: "POLICE" in block letters. Mari steeled herself for the person she knew would be manning the front desk. She took a deep breath, and walked in.

"Hey baby! Do you want to grab a pint together after my shift?" A nasal voice emanated from the front desk. A scrubby officer was sitting with his feet up on the desk, smoking a cigarette. _That's probably a health code violation._ Mari thought. She glared daggers at the annoying officer, lowering her head to create more of an intimidating presence.  
"Calm down! That's not very ladylike. Are you on your period or something?" The officer grinned, revealing his grimy teeth. Mari generally did not enjoy humanity, and this man was a prime example of humanity's worst.  
"Excuse me polite and respectful officer, but would you kindly direct me to the office of Mr. Twivel?" Mari said, letting each word ooze with venom. The officer visibly decided not to mess with this crazy lady.  
"Room 271, sweetheart." The officer leaned back, trying to maintain his composure.  
"Thank you." Mari trotted towards room 271 with a sigh of relief.

When Mari reached Thomas's door, she was surprised. Thomas always tended to have flashy decorations on his door, but his door was unassuming, with a small bronze plaque that read: "Thomas Twivel". Mari knocked.  
"Come in." A soft voice whispered from inside the door. Mari entered. The entire inside of the office was covered in rainbow glitter. Thomas appeared to have spotlights trained on his neon rimmed desk, which had a red velvet carpet leading up to it. Mari face palmed.

"Hi Thomas. Went a little glitter crazy, didn't we?" Mari said, raising an eyebrow. Thomas was perfectly normal looking by any standards. He was wearing a white shirt with a tie, but he was also wearing a pair of jeans. Thomas had pink fluffy bunny slippers on; he said that normal shoes were "too boring".  
"Hi Mari! Yeah, you know me. I love my glitter," Thomas said with a smirk.  
Mari laughed "Okay, down to business," She said. "I have possession of the extra planar being at the moment. I also have compiled a list of its known abilities. I recommend you exercise extreme caution around the being, as its mental state is extremely unstable," _Why am I calling Sans an it? He is not an animal!_ Mari's oppressed conscience protested, only to be snuffed out by her colder side.  
"Why would its mental state be unstable?" Thomas asked while Mari handed him her report. She had typed it while Sans was pretending to sleep. She had caught onto that quirk of Sans rather quickly. "The professor who I was assigned to watch built a machine for the express purpose of gathering inter planar beings. However, the machine only collected beings from planes where the world was ending. Given that its world was ending, I believe it is safe to assume that it went through some trauma," Mari replied.  
"Interesting. You have on your report here that the being is able to teleport. Does it have any other extraordinary abilities?" Thomas asked curiously.  
"Not that I have witnessed, but I wouldn't be surprised if it did have other abilities," Mari responded with a small laugh.  
"Great work. I'll send the special operations team over to apprehend the being on Thursday. Make sure it's secured by then," Thomas ordered. Mari checked her phone. It was Tuesday.  
"That seems good. Do I receive a raise for all of this?" Mari asked causally.

"Just a medal. The budget isn't endless." Thomas replied, quoting one of his favorite book characters. Mari chuckled, then strode out of the glitter covered office. She walked out of the building, onto the street, and ended up collapsing into a bench in the train platform. She buried her head in her hands, shaking. _I have broken drug rings, fought one on one with thugs, and collected libraries full of forbidden information. I have seduced leaders, killed prophets, and toppled empires. I have never even felt one ounce of guilt for my actions. Why does betraying this one kid feel so wrong?_ Mari thought.

* * *

 **Plot twist! *Cue drama button* This was fun to write. I sorta knew at the beginning there would be some secret with Mari. Anyways, have a great week! See you guys next Sunday! :)**


	8. Chapter 8

_"_ _papyrus_ _!" Sans called, his voice increasing in intensity. "_ _papyrus, where are you? i can't find you! where are you hiding? please, just come out! this isn't funny anymore…_ _" Sans cried, his voice hoarse from screaming._

 _*but nobody came_

 _He was standing in the shining judgement hall, waiting for a power he knew, a power he dreaded. Time seemed to fold on itself, fabric tearing to extend seconds into minutes, minutes into hours, hours into days, days into years, years into decades, decades into centuries, and centuries into millennia. Click. Click. Click. Someone's footsteps echoed against the polished tiles, coming closer by the second. Sans wanted this to be over; to feel the blade slice across his rib cage, to be welcomed by Papyrus into the next realm._

 _"So, this is the last time, is it not?" A sugar sweet voice echoed ominously throughout the hall._

 _"_ _let's get to the point._ _"_

 _"That would be boring, though. Why don't we have a little fun?" The disjointed voice taunted. The hall faded into black, leaving Sans alone as lines of code swirled around him, wrapping his arms and legs. He did not fight back. He just gave up._

 _"Why don't we tamper a little with the code here? I am the true master of this world, after all." The voice giggled. "We could erase Toriel, Undyne, Mettaton, Alphys, or maybe even," the voiced paused, relishing its power. "Papyrus."_

 _"_ _no! don't take papyrus! take me, please!_ _" Sans begged. Even if he failed to protect his world, his brother deserved a second chance._

 _"If you want your brother to live, when the choice comes, you will hand me the world you are inhabiting on a silver platter." The voice erupted into giggles, quickly growing in volume and intensity. The code binding Sans increased in pressure. It was too tight, he was breaking, shattering, fragmenting-_

 _._

Sans jolted awake screaming and writing. Cool sweat covered his face and ran down the nape of his neck. Grey morning light filtered into his room through closed blinds, giving the room an ethereal feel.

"Sans! What's wrong?" Mari burst into the dimly lit bedroom. Worry was written across her face.

"dream. sorry for bothering you." Sans slumped back into his hastily set up cot. The dream reminded him of the precariousness of his situation. Before, when he made a grievous mistake, the kid would reset. He would have a second chance. There were no resets to save him now. Sans once had a family. He had failed to protect them. He once had friends, friends whom he let down. He once had a world, but he watched it crumble to dust. _Now I'm just an outcast, a forgotten byproduct of a shattered universe._ Sans reflected morosely. Of course, Sans would do anything for his brother. Even sacrifice a universe. All this universe had was a possibly psychotic professor and a secretary who never revealed anything about herself, like an OC in poorly written fan fiction. Mari had been nothing but kind to him, but Sans had a chilling gut feeling that he could not trust her.

"Sans! Are you coming?" Mari yelled from the kitchen. "Your pancakes will be ice cubes by the time you eat them!"

"i'm coming, mari!" Sans yelled back, all thoughts of betrayal pushed out of his mind by the tantalizing promise of fluffy, buttery pancakes. He wrapped the scarlet scarf around his neck, and pulled on the violet hoodie. Now the only problem was standing up from the warm, soft cot. Sans was certainly not up to the challenge.

.

A couple minutes later, Sans and Mari were munching on pancakes.

"Sans, I have to work at the lab with Celeriac today, so would you mind tagging along?" Mari asked over the burnt pancakes. The pancakes were edible, but Sans had to smother them in maple syrup.

"nope," Sans garbled through a mouthful of pancake. _I'd go anywhere to be out of this place._ Sans thought. Watching TV and trying to stay awake were not the most exciting activities.

"Do you want any coffee?" Mari asked.

"heck yes. give me a gallon of the stuff," Sans replied with a grin, holding his mug out. Sans had picked out a Halloween mug that had a laughing skeleton on it. It said: "you tickle my funny bone!".

"Careful, if you drink too much, you might have a latte problems." Mari said with a wink.

"haven't I had this coffee before?" Sans asked, and frowned at his coffee.

"What do you mean?" Mari inquired, puzzled.

"i have a sense of deja brew," Sans said with a huge grin. Mari gave a tired smile.

"Good one. Come on, let's go. Reports don't file themselves, you know." She said, and stood up. Sans followed her out the apartment door.

One hallway, elevator ride, and lobby later, Sans and Mari were waiting on the street outside Mari's apartment building. It was drizzling, the uncomfortable kind that slowly soaked Sans to the bone.

"are we taking the 'L'?" Sans asked nervously as they waited under Mari's black umbrella.

"No. I thought we would take the bus," Mari answered. Sans released a breath he had not realized he was holding.

"thanks," Sans said, staring off into the distance. Mari nodded in acknowledgement.

The bus ride to Celeriac's lab was filled with comfortable stretches of silence. Sans glanced over at Mari. She seemed to be lost in thought.

.

*check

*MARI 5 ATK 15 DEF

*1 LV 0 EXP

*She is trying to make a decision.

.

 _Decision?_ Sans wondered. _Well, at least I still have my abilities. I shouldn't use any of my more obvious abilities, however._

"are you okay?" Sans whispered, trying not to startle Mari.

"Yeah. I'm fine," Mari mumbled dejectedly. _That's strange. She seems exhausted._ Sans observed. He had seen symptoms of the very same type of exhaustion on himself before. He had been in a timeline where the kid had left just him and Alphys, struggling to rule a fading population. It was the type of exhaustion of people with far too much responsibility on their shoulders.

"Do you believe in fate?" Mari asked, a pensive look on her face.

"i do. there's nothing i can change in this world. it all stays the same no matter what i do." Sans answered, staring up at the ceiling of the bus.

"Huh." Mari responded softly.

.

When Sans and Mari arrived at Celeriac's lab, Celeriac was waiting for them.

"Hello Mari!" Celeriac greeted cheerfully from inside her office.

"Hi!" Mari waved back. "I brought Sans with me today. Is that okay with you?"

"Yeah, now that the police aren't pestering me," Celeriac replied. Sans and Mari entered her office. The office was nearly spotless compared to the state of chaos it had been in after Omega Flowey wrecked it.

"The police were really persistent. They couldn't find Sans in any citizen registries. Heck, they couldn't find Sans in any registries," Celeriac continued, and snickered.

"wait, what did you tell the police about me?" Sans asked nervously. Mari and Celeriac stared at him awkwardly for a second.

"Um..." Celeriac started.

"We said that you held Celeriac hostage at knifepoint for money. I ended up forcing the knife from your hand. You then tried to punch me, and I stabbed you in the arm with your own knife." Mari recalled sheepishly.

"wow. that's one heck of a story you made up." Sans said incredulously.

.

One hour later, Sans was reclining at the front desk with Mari. He was fiddling idly with a puzzle cube. He spun around and around in his soft swivel chair. _Wow. This is hard. No wonder Papyrus had so much trouble with puzzle cubes._ Sans thought. He was still wearing the scarlet scarf Mari had given him earlier. He found it helped calm him down.

"Who is Papyrus?" Mari asked nonchalantly, typing at her computer.

"what?" Sans was taken aback by the sudden question.

"You were calling out for someone named Papyrus last night," Mari said without looking up from her computer. Sans felt an embarrassed blush creep up his cheeks.

"why do you want to know?" He asked, glaring suspiciously at Mari. A couple of tense minutes passed. The only sound was the clock ticking. Sans sighed in defeat. He had lost this silent war of wills.

"he was my brother," Sans stated in a sadly, looking away.

"Was…" Mari repeated. An uncomfortable stillness filled the room. Neither of them spoke again for a long time.

"Mari! Sans! Take a look at this!" Celeriac's excited shriek shocked Sans out of his nap.

"what is it?" Sans yawned as he rubbed his eyes. He glanced over at Mari. She was already out of her seat, gesturing for Sans to follow her into Celeriac's office. Sans trudged after her into the office.

"Look!" Celeriac held up a vial of an inky liquid. Sans's eyes widened in surprise and amazement.

"is that void material?" He asked, his face lighting up.

"Yeah! I found a chunk of it in the corner after you came in," Celeriac affirmed with an excited look.

"did you analyze it? i've been trying to get my hands on a sample for years!" Sans asked, bouncing happily. Mari looked surprised at Sans's display of enthusiasm.

"what? i like science," Sans said defensively.

"Anyways, look at this!" Professor Celeriac pushed a clear plastic slide filled with the substance under a microscope. Sans put his bright cyan eye to the microscope. The substance appeared to be in constant motion, but what Sans noticed was not that.

"there's no cells. with a microscope as powerful as this, we should be able to see all of the separate cells that make up the void stuff," Sans observed.

"Bingo! Do you know what that means?" Celeriac was quizzing Sans.

"the substance is made of particles much smaller than atoms. at that size, light and mass are indistinguishable. this material could lead to..." Sans trailed, stunned.

"An ultra-black substance able to suck up any light! It's awesome!" Celeriac finished with a squeal of delight.

"That's great! Why don't you come down by my apartment for dinner to celebrate?" Mari suggested.

"Seems good!" Celeriac replied.

.

A couple of hours later, Sans and Celeriac were sitting at the cramped dining room table. Mari was in the kitchen, making dinner.

"Sans, is it okay if I asked you some questions?" Celeriac inquired.

"sure. i might not be comfortable answering some of them," Sans replied, shifting uncomfortably.

"What did the transition between planes feel like?" Celeriac asked, leaning forward.

"in all honesty, it was pretty painful. i seemed to be floating in some black substance, which burned like acid. it wasn't very fun," Sans answered, chuckling darkly. Celeriac pulled out a clipboard from her purse, and jotted down some notes.

"Did you experience any physical changes during your transition?"

"yeah. i used to be a skeleton."

"You gained weight during your transition between planes?"

"no, i was a literal skeleton," Sans replied, amused. Celeriac looked a little alarmed at this bit of information.

"What caused your timeline to collapse?" Celeriac recovered quickly, chewing the end of her pencil. Sans's mind blurred with the memories rushing in. _Gold. Red on silver on gold. They do not care. They killed everyone I love._ Sans began to hyperventilate, opening his luminescent eyes as wide as he could. _I'm so tired. I'll only sleep for one minute. It couldn't hurt, right?_

"Dinner is ready!" Mari called from the kitchen. Sans jerked out of his flashback, startled and shaken. Celeriac was looking at him with disgusting pity. _Sans glared back at her. I don't need your pity, psycho scientist._ Sans thought bitterly. Mari stumbled in carrying a huge platter of spaghetti and meatballs. _Papyrus used to make spaghetti and meatballs._ Sans remembered. He stood up, horror written across his face.

"i-i'm not hungry." Sans stuttered, and fled from the dining room. When he was safely in his bed, he curled up around the crimson scarf and cried.


	9. Chapter 9

It had been about one hour since Sans had stormed off from the dinner table. Mari and Celeriac were now nestled in Mari's overly comfy couch. Neither of them dared to speak for fear it would violate some unspoken code of conduct.

"Celeriac, I'm worried." Mari shattered the silence with a verbal sledgehammer.

"Why are you worried?" Celeriac asked, concerned. It's show time. Mari thought. She absolutely had to convince Celeriac on this point, or else Thomas's plan would not work.

"Sans is clearly under a lot of stress. I'm worried that his magic could spiral out of control. We both know that he can teleport. What if ends up in a bad part of town, or-" Celeriac cut Mari off by rubbing her back soothingly. Mari pushed crocodile tears to the forefront of her vision.

"I see. If it gives you peace of mind, I can make a device that will restrain his magic." Celeriac replied. Those were the words Mari wanted to hear.

"How will you do it?" Mari asked curiously.

"I was analyzing the video of Sans disappearing from the hospital. When he disappeared, he was surrounded by what appears to be similar to electricity."

"Really?"

"Yes. By channeling the electricity away from his body and into an insulator, we should be able to restrain him if need be."

"Oh my gosh, thank you! You're a lifesaver!" Mari gushed, relieved that her plan worked so easily.

"I can bring it over tomorrow." Celeriac said, and looked away guiltily.

"You made it already?" Mari asked. It seemed she and Celeriac had similar thought processes.

"It never pays to be too careful, especially when one is dealing with teleportation." Celeriac recited sagely.

"Good to know." Mari replied. She paused, mustering courage.

"May I spend the day with Sans tomorrow? He has a lot on his mind, and I thought I'd show him one of my favorite places." Mari asked. _Even if I can't stop Thomas from taking Sans, I can at least make sure Sans is happy for a day._ She reasoned.

"You'll have plenty of time with him later." Celeriac shrugged.

"I have a feeling that he may be gone before we know it." Mari answered cryptically. Celeriac sighed, annoyed with her secretary's sentimentality.

"Fine, take the day off. I can't stop you. I'll see you tomorrow." Celeriac surrendered, lifting herself slowly off the couch. Mari internally cheered. The rest of the night was uneventful, and Mari fell into a deep sleep before she knew it.

.

"Wake up sleepyhead! It's a beautiful day outside!" Mari shouted as loud as she could into Sans's room. Dried tears streaked Sans's face, and he was curled up in a fetal position around the scarlet scarf. In this position, Mari could see a large scar where Sans appeared to have been slashed across the chest with a sharp object. The wound would have been borderline fatal, even with proper treatment. She felt a pang of sympathy for the child.

"five more minutes…" Sans groaned, pulling his pillow over his face.

"Come on! It's Wednesday, the best day of the week." Mari paused. "You need to take a shower. You stink." Mari wrinkled her nose as the powerful odor of teenager hit her. Sans sat up, confused.

"shower? what's that?" Sans asked seriously, rubbing his eyes. Mari stared at him incredulously.

"You don't know what a shower is?" Mari asked, gaping.

"remember, I was a skeleton. i didn't exactly sweat." Sans replied nonchalantly.

"Bathroom. Now." Mari ordered with a stern look that Sans knew not to argue with.

.

With a considerably less smelly Sans, (Mari had to show him how to turn the shower handle) and a breakfast of very burnt toast, Mari and Sans were all ready to conquer the world. Sort of. The bus had arrived fairly quickly, and Sans and Mari were sitting in the back, looking out the large windows.

"where are we going?" Sans inquired.

"It's a secret." Mari grinned devilishly.

"can I take a guess?" Sans looked at her with puppy eyes.

"I don't know, can you?" Mari stuck her tongue out, using the old English teacher trick. Sans scowled.

"put your tongue back in your mouth. it's rather tasteless." Sans joked, and Mari groaned at the bad pun.

"Approaching Lake Shore Drive." The bus driver yelled grumpily. Mari could not blame the bus driver for being crabby. To be a bus driver, one has to wake up at an ungodly hour, and then deal with extremely annoying people all day. All day.

"Come on, this is our stop. Close your eyes, I want to surprise you." Mari ordered. She watched Sans shut his eyes, only to leave them slightly open.

"Close them all the way. I see you peeking!" Mari admonished playfully, tying his scarlet scarf around his eyes. Sans humphed. She led him off the bus, and into the building.

.

"Two for the 2:30 show, please." Mari asked the sleepy looking attendant at the front desk. Given that it was the middle of Wednesday, the building was almost completely empty.

"That will be twenty dollars." The attendant droned. They looked like they wanted to be anywhere but there. Mari handed the attendant a crinkled twenty-dollar bill.

"Thank you. The auditorium is ahead and to your left." The attendant leaned back in their chair and started snoring.

.

Mari guided the still blindfolded Sans through the wandering, spotless hallway and to the left, entering a cylindrical auditorium with a large domed ceiling. Cushy slanted seats faced towards the center of the room, where a projector slept. Mari carefully placed him in one of the auditorium's oblique seats.

"You may open your eyes now." Mari whispered to Sans, removing the scarlet scarf from around his eyes. The room was pleasantly dim, light enough to see by, but dark enough to emit a pleasant ambiance.

"where are we?" Sans asked, confusion evident on his face.

"Just watch." Mari shushed him. A moment passed. Two. Three. Then, the domed ceiling lit up with stars, blue stars, red stars, stats that dazzled with brilliance, and stars that seemed on the verge of fading. Sans gasped.

"w-where are we?" He stuttered in amazement.

"Adler Planetarium." Mari responded, amused at Sans's look of amazement. She was glad to see him so excited. Sans had not been happy in a long time, she could tell.

.

"Hello, I'm Tadashi. I'll be your guide today." Mari and Sans had been so absorbed in staring at the glittering stars, they had not noticed the middle aged Japanese man step up to raised wooden podium.

"What's your names?" Tadashi asked, clearly pleased to have visitors at this slow time of week.

"I'm Mari, and this is my nephew, Sans." Mari introduced them. Sans confusedly glanced over at her. Mari pursed her lips, silently warning him not to speak. _It's a bit of a stretch, but he might buy it._ Mari hoped.

"Nice. Welcome to Adler Observatory! Right now, what you're seeing is a live view of the night sky." Tadashi explained, making a broad sweeping gesture to the ceiling with his arm. He unclipped a worn laser pointer from his belt, and pointed to a set of stars in the shape of a large spoon. "Here is the Big Dipper." Tadashi paused, letting Sans and Mari stare in wonder at the collection of sparkling lights above them.

"Right next to it is the Little Dipper…"

.

The rest of the show was extremely pleasant. Since they were the only ones at the observatory, the show was more like a conversation between friends than a formal presentation of the cosmos. Tadashi seemed overjoyed to have anyone show up at all. Mari felt sort of bad for the guy. Sans had been very enthusiastic, asking questions about each and every constellation. The show had ended up going thirty minutes over, but none of the three minded.

"Why did you take me to the observatory?" Sans had asked once they were outside.

"I don't know. You don't you had time to look up at the stars very often." Mari had responded. Sans seemed to find that statement hilarious, laughing until he was gasping for breath.

"You do not know how true that is." Sans had wheezed, ribs aching from laughter. Mari decided not to press the subject. They then went out for burgers at a nice joint Mari knew called Alcott's. It was enjoyable, except that the ketchup cap came loose and squirted five tons of ketchup on Mari's fries. When Mari and Sans came back to her apartment, it was very late. Mari made sure Sans was asleep, and then headed for the 'L'. There was a task she needed to do.

.

"Mari! How nice to see you here!" Sprog slurred when she was in her normal train car. He was drunk. Again. Mari felt a measure of pity for this man.

"Hi Sprog! How are you?" Mari tried her best to keep a cheery smile on her face, even though she felt like a rhino had danced over her brain.

"I'm good. Whatcha been doing?" Sprog slurred, drooling on the ugly brown carpeted floor of the train car.

"Nothing much. I took my nephew to the planetarium today." Mari said chirpily, trying to make small talk.

"Oh, I didn't realize you had a nephew." Sprog's tone of voice switched from slurred to crystal clear in an instant. Mari felt her insides go cold. Was he really just a hopeless drunkard?

"I my sister and I were not on speaking terms, but I volunteered to babysit her child for a day to make it up to her." Mari switched on her defense mode, devoting every cell of her being to analyzing Sprog. Now that she observed him more closely, his clothes were far too expensive, his hair too neat for a wandering alcoholic.

"You have no sister. You do have two younger brothers, however. One is studying as a veterinary technician at Michigan State University, and the other aspires to study engineering at Brown University. They don't know what your true occupation is, they think you are a secretary. Ha! As if someone of your," Sprog paused, searching for a word. "caliber would settle for being a mere secretary." Sprog grinned, reaching for a pole. Mari felt the train screech to an abrupt stop in the middle of the dark tunnel. She was thrown painfully against the cold metal wall of the train, feeling herself slide down to the floor, dazed.

"We are experiencing technical difficulties. Please stay calm and wait for further instructions." Mari felt a non-artificial voice rumble out of the loudspeakers. Sprog seemed unaffected by the sudden force, as if he expected it to happen. Had he planned this whole event? How has he known she was going to be here? Sprog handed her a piece of paper with ten hastily scrawled digits written on it.

"If you need help, just call. Remember: The underworld repays its debts." Sprog leaned against the doors, grinning lazily with dead eyes, the type of eyes Mari had seen on Sans when she first met him. Sprog lifted his arm, throwing a round item to the ground. A blinding flash of light emanated from his position, and Sprog was gone. Mari stared at the crumpled piece of paper in her hand. _It seems I may have made some potential allies. Or enemies, perhaps._

 _._

"Hey cutie!" The annoying officer at the front desk waved at Mari as she entered the police building. Mari ignored him. She knew exactly where she wanted to go, where she needed to be. The hallways of the police station were painted a dull peach, the type one sees in doctor's offices and poorly funded schools. Mari's shoes clicked on the stained tile floors as she breezed straight past the front desk, into the dim hallways, past the rows of offices lined up like first graders waiting to go inside from recess on a chilly day. Mari only stopped when she reached an unassuming door she has stopped at before, the one with the nameplate that read: "Thomas Twivel." She knocked three times briskly.

"Come in." The same quiet voice emanated from inside. Mari paused. _Am I making the right choice?_ She worried, hesitating for a millisecond. However, Mari was the never type to pause; her thoughts and actions were intertwined like ivy to a lattice. She opened the door, stepping into Thomas's glitter covered office. Thomas had his back to her, staring at nothing in particular. The office was pitch black, save for the light that spilled in from the hallway.

"Thomas, I believe there is a detail I left out of my report earlier." Mari stated bluntly, without exchanging pleasantries.

"And what would that be?" Thomas replied slowly and coldly. Given that the spotlights in his office were off, the glitter in his office seemed dull and colorless without the light they depended on. Golden light spilled from behind Mari, reflecting off the glitter to illuminate the path to Thomas's desk.

"The inter planar being, Sans, is sentient." Mari said. Thomas sat at his desk, staring at his hands. A minute passed of silence. _Did I make a mistake? Is he mad?_ Mari wondered.

"Mari, do you know what these hands have done?" Thomas stated softly, creepily, turning to face her.

"I do not care if the being is sentient. It has abilities. Abilities that will help save humanity. This is for the greater good." Thomas howled. Mari felt a shiver run down her spine.

"Thomas, by your orders, I have ruined many. However, all of them were undeniably guilty. They had hurt, maimed, killed. Sans is completely innocent. He was wounded, crippled, and his life was destroyed. What you are saying… is wrong. I can't let you carry this through!" Mari slammed her hands down on Thomas's desk. Thomas slowly looked up, lifting his eyes to meet hers. Mari froze. The whites of his eyes were bloodshot; he had huge bags under his eyes. Every cell in his body seemed to show a sort of resignation, a surrender to life.

"I don't care. You will do your duty, and you will do it proudly for your country." Thomas growled, enunciating every word like he was speaking to a first grader. Mari felt like prey, and Thomas was the hunter.

"Yes, sir." Mari resigned with a sigh, her frenzied energy spent. She left the dark office without looking back. She had a job to do.

* * *

 **Hello! Sorry if this chapter is bad. I finished it sorta last minute, I was extremely busy this week. Anyways, I want to know: Do you guys want Mari to take Sprog up on his offer? Have a nice week, I'll see you next Sunday! :)**


	10. Chapter 10

Sans had thankfully had no nightmares that night. However, when he woke up, his experience in years of resets warned him that something was very wrong.

"Sans! Time to wake up! It's Thursday!" Mari called from the kitchen, a small waver in her voice.

"what?" Sans felt experimentally around his neck. He was still pretty groggy. There was a band wrapped around Sans's neck, cold and metallic. It felt extremely durable. Sans doubted he would be able to remove it without help. _Wait. Why am I wearing a collar?_ Sans snapped awake, unsuccessfully trying to teleport out of the bedroom.

"Ah!" Sans gasped. His magic was somehow stifled by the collar, making his magic pool around his neck. He collapsed to the floor, writhing in pain. Sans noticed Mari arrive at the door of the bedroom.

"Mari! Help me take it off! It hurts!" He wailed, scratching desperately at the burning appendage.

"I'm so sorry, Sans," Mari looked at him sympathetically. _Why isn't she helping me?_ Sans wondered, panicking. Mari reached into an athletic looking green bag and took out a gleaming pistol. Incidentally, for the second time that week, Sans was looking down the barrel of a loaded weapon.

The next few minutes passed in the white hot haze of pain and fear. Sans foggily remembered Mari barking on some sort of radio, and binding him to a hard chair. Pathetic tears ran down his face the whole time, even as Sans wished futilely for them to stop.

"why did you do this?" He asked Mari once the pain had subsided to the point where he could think clearly.

"I did what needed to be done." Mari responded, not looking at Sans.

"when will they be coming to take me away?" Sans asked. He hated how much he sounded like a child. Even though he looked young, he had probably lived hundreds of years between all the resets. Mari did not respond.

.

*check

*Mari

Atk: 5

Def: 15

HP: 20

LV: 1

EXP: 0

*Why?

.

"Mari! How nice it is to see you here!" A voice called from the entrance of Mari's apartment. A nicely dressed man came in, except that he was wearing pink fluffy bunny slippers. Four heavily armed soldiers followed him, including one medic. Sans focused on the nicely dressed man.

.

*check

*Thomas Twivel

Atk: 28

Def: 12

HP: 56

LV: 10

EXP: 32

.

*You might be surprised when you find out what he does for a living.

 _Oh dear tem. He's a murder._ Sans cursed silently.

"Hello. You must be Sans," Thomas tried to say say reassuringly, but Sans was not fooled. Thomas had the eyes of a wild animal, not some office assistant.

"yes," Sans whispered, his mouth bone dry.

"I've heard a lot about you." He said, signaling to the medic behind him. The medic pulled out a long, gleaming syringe, and advanced cautiously towards the bound Sans.

"no. please don't. I don't want this," Sans pleaded, scrabbling at the knotted bonds chafing against his wrists.

"Relax. This won't hurt a bit," The medic rasped, resting the sharp silver tip of the syringe against Sans's forearm.

"i don't want this! please!" Sans sobbed, mustering up his magic even though he knew it would activate the hated collar. Before he could release his magic, the syringe plunged into his arm. Sans drifted off into a deep sleep.

.

 _"Even the greenest leaves fall. The most fragrant blossoms always wilt. The strongest universes crumble. You know that all must end," Chara declared. Sans and Chara were standing across from each other in a twisted version of San's judgement hall. Pure rainbow light filtered in through the windows, illuminating the long hall. The walls were paneled in intricately carved ebony, depicting scenes of fields, forests, and mountains. The floor was made of marbled forest green tiles, so glasslike that Sans could see a perfect reflection of himself in them. He looked tired, broken. He looked like he had been betrayed. Not surprisingly, Chara had absolutely no reflection. There was no entrances and no exits. There was no escape, no place to flee._

 _"nice place kid. this is your realm, correct?" Sans asked, carefully controlling his tone. He sounded dangerously civil, straining to be casual._

 _"Yes. It's peaceful, isn't it? So much unlike the world you inhabit currently," Chara's responded with a gentle smile. They took a step forward, running their hand along an ivory pillar on the way._

 _"why am i here?" Sans asked warily, not taking his eyes away from the child steps away from him._

 _Chara froze, a look of amusement on their face._

 _"Why? You already know, Sans," They suggested. Sans sighed. When they had been living with Tori and Asgore, they always made the most cryptic remarks. Riddles was always their favorite game; riddles so puzzling that Sans's head throb trying to figure them out._

 _"kid, i really don't," Sans replied, shrugging._

 _"I've come to convince you to let me rule this world. Not the world of your family, but the world of humans," Chara explained. Sans stared blankly at her. Chara looked at him like they thought he was an idiot._

 _"Well, I guess I'll just have to explain some of my reasoning. In real life, of course" With a snap of their fingers, Sans and Chara were gone from the hall of the dead._

* * *

 **Sorry about the short chapter. I was going to have it be longer, but i didn't have the time. This fic is probably going be about 16 chapters, give or take. Have a nice day!**


	11. Chapter 11

Mari had not touched her apartment since Sans had been dragged away by Thomas. The chair where she had bound the delirious Sans sat to listlessly her left, frayed ropes hanging off its back. Scuff marks scarred her ugly peach carpet where Sans had hopelessly struggled against an inevitable dose of tranquilizers. There were filthy bootprints smudged on Mari's otherwise spotless kitchen tiles. Mari had served the three hardened soldiers coffee while Sans was roughly shoved into an armored van on the grey street. She had served them coffee because she could not even bear to look at the hot cocoa. After the triumphant soldiers had driven away, there was a gleaming bottle of Jeppson's on the dining room table that Mari had used to drink herself into a sobbing stupor. It was the next morning, and she had one heck of a hangover. Oh glorious joy.

After ten minutes of feeling like complete trash with a throbbing headache and an extremely dry throat, the deafening silence in Mari's apartment was finally shattered by the cheery ringtone of Mari's smartphone. She picked up her battered phone.  
"Hello?" Mari answered groggily. She sounded like a sick bullfrog mixed with a dying donkey.  
"Hey, Mari! It's been a long time since we spoke, so I thought I'd call." Shin greeted chipperly. Wow, Shin was way too cheery for six in the fracking morning. Even if it was a Friday. Shin was a once a close friend of Mari's. However, the two had them had slowly drifted away once Mari started her more - unsavory work.  
"Astounding deduction, Sherlock. What has it been? Six months?" Mari teased with an empty chuckle.  
"Seven months, three weeks and four days," Shin said bluntly.  
"Wow. I didn't know you counted," Mari responded, feeling slightly guilty for neglecting her friend. "Hey, I know this is really out of the blue, but could you give me some advice?"  
"Sure! Ask away." Shin affirmed. What was Mari supposed to say to Shin? Oh hey, I secretly work as a spy for the government, and I just captured an alien. But don't worry! He's nice, and I'm trying to figure out what to do about it. Yeah, that did not seem to cut it for Mari. She took a calming breath, searching for a plausible lie, or at least an omission of truth that would work.  
"I... I really hurt someone, like, I destroyed them. I don't how to fix it. I'm afraid that if I try to do something, I'll just screw up my life more, if it's even possible," Mari said, immediately feeling as if a weight was off her shoulders.  
"Mari, don't worry about it. Do what you have to, short of killing fluffy bunnies. Which would you rather have, lifelong guilt or the knowledge that you at least tried?" Shin advised. Mari milled it over her advice for a couple of seconds before realizing that Shin was inescapably, irrefutably right.  
"Oh my gosh, thank you! You're right!" Mari hurried, stumbling over her words.  
"What are you going to do?" Shin asked with a fake tone of worry.  
"I'm going to set this right!" Mari laughed and hung up, feeling foolish for not seeing such a simple solution. How could she have been such a complete and total idiot!

Mari quickly dialed Celeriac's number. "Celeriac, I need you to come over to my apartment right now," Mari ordered without stopping for the pleasantries seemingly required in every single meaningless conversation.  
"Mari? What's wrong?" Celeriac replied, concerned.  
"It's Sans. Someone took him." Mari knew this was not a blatant lie, as Thomas had kidnapped Sans. However, Mari was not remotely ready to tell Celeriac about her betrayal. Not yet.  
"Frack," Celeriac spit.  
"Massive understatement."

Celeriac rushed over to Mari's apartment in a record breaking ten minutes. Her hair was a sparrow's nest, and her clothing was mismatched and disheveled.  
"Mari, tell me exactly what happened," Celeriac ordered, determination blazing in her slitted pupils.  
"Look." Mari stepped aside to allow Celeriac the full view of her wrecked apartment. It looked like a crime scene, and Celeriac could see that. She gaped, standing in Mari's doorway, pure shock flitting in waves across her face.  
"I need to sit down." Celeriac breathed. Mari quickly guided her over to her couch. Celeriac collapsed into the couch, holding her head in her hands.  
"Frack. This is much more urgent than I thought."  
"I'll go make hot cocoa. Those slimy buggers stole all of my coffee," Mari complained, shuffling to her kitchen. She mechanically made the hot cocoa, nearly burning her hand in the process. When she walked back into the living room, she had two steaming hot mugs of goodness in her hands.  
"Here." She passed a mug of creamy hot cocoa to Celeriac, who was staring at a stain in the wall like it was the secret to discovering the meaning of life. Celeriac took a sip of hot cocoa, and immediately relaxed.  
"Darn Mari, this is good! What's your secret ingredient?"  
"The souls of the innocent..."  
"What?"  
"Just kidding! Cinnamon and a hefty cup of sugar," Mari responded, cracking a weak smile. They sat together for a while, not needing any form of verbal communication. They both knew the other was reeling from their own separate versions of what happened.  
"I'll take a look around and see what I find." Celeriac groaned after the hot cocoa was long slurped, pulling herself up off the couch. Mari followed, bracing herself for a long and tiring search.

"Mari! I found something!" Celeriac shrieked after literally five seconds of searching. That was fast. Mari stiffened. What if Celeriac found evidence that Mari had betrayed Sans? What would Celeriac think of her then?  
"What?" Mari forced herself to ask calmly.  
"Look. This syringe is marked as a Barbiturate. From this, I know Sans was taken to area 42," Celeriac answered, her mouth a grim line.  
"How do you know? That doesn't seem like much evidence," Mari pointed out.  
"Barbiturates are slightly more potent than Benzodiazepines, but they were mostly discontinued because of several… unpleasant side effects. Only area 42 has the authorization to use Barbiturates, because it takes in only special subjects. Like Sans." Celeriac explained. She paused, tensing up slightly.  
"I would know because my son works there."

"What?" Mari gibbered, shocked.  
"Don't look at me that way, I cut all connection from him once I found out his real job," Celeriac protested.  
"Well, that rift ends now. Call your son." Mari replied out of sheer desperation. Time was running out if Sans was truly in such a place. Because of her.  
"But-" Celeriac started.  
"No buts. Suck it up. Do you want Sans to die?" Mari cut her off with a sharp tone.  
Celeriac opened and closed her mouth a few times like a fish out of water.  
"I'll do it," She answered.  
"Yes! Thank you!" Mari jumped up excitedly.  
"But you have to call with me," Celeriac finished.  
"Fine by me," Mari said, pulling out her old smartphone.

"Good morning, this is the American League of Dental Hygienists. How may I help you?" A dull voice droned from Mari's phone speakers.  
"That's just their cover," Celeriac whispered to Mari.  
"I would like to speak to Briar Celeriac," Professor Celeriac responded professionally. Mari held her breath in anticipation. Would this work?  
"One moment please." The receptionist said. Terrible music began to play from the phone's speakers. The music seemed to be a pop song, but it was played with instruments that should never, ever be put in a pop song. Ever. Mari started to giggle after thirty seconds, the song was so bad.  
"What's so fun-" Celeriac was cut off by a voice answering on the other end of the phone.

"Hello. This is Briar Celeriac. How may I help you?" Briar greeted. Celeriac seemed to freeze, so Mari took the initiative.  
"Uncle Terry has come for a surprise visit." She said, slightly grimacing. Bad memories.  
"Yes. Of course. I'll be there immediately." Briar responded, sounding flustered. Mari hung up before Briar could say anything else.  
"What was that?" Celeriac looked very confused.  
"Standard government code. It means: return to your home base to report. Now, you wouldn't mind directing me to your house?" Mari grinned impishly.

One ten minute car ride later, Celeriac and Mari were at Celeriac's house, sitting at the dinner table. Snip. Snip. Mari could hear the nearly imperceptible crack of Celeriac biting her elongated nails. Celeriac's house was not overly unusual at a first glance. From the outside, it looked like any ordinary house. It had neatly trimmed hedges, slightly wilted flower boxes, and pastel green walls. However, inside… Mari did not know how to properly describe the interior of the house. The interior seemed too neat to be a living space, too neat and polished. All of the colors were muted, giving the interior the feeling of stepping into a perfectly monochrome world.  
"Nice house," Mari said politely, glancing around.  
"Thanks," Celeriac replied, not looking at Mari.

After five minutes of waiting, the front door creaked open, and Celeriac jumped slightly in her seat. A young man wearing a crisp white lab coat complete with stethoscope stepped in. His eyes seemed glued to the floor, and he clutched a clipboard to his chest like a child holding a teddy bear.  
"O-oh. Hi." The young man waved shyly with an unconvincing smile. He gazed at Mari for a couple of seconds, then shifted his gaze to Celeriac. He seemed very perplexed.  
"You must be Briar," Mari said, pulling herself from the chair. "It's a pleasure to meet you."  
"It-it's nice to meet you t-too," Briar stammered, backing up slightly.  
"What did you call me for?" He asked, regaining some of his composure.  
"Your mother would like to speak with you," Mari answered, gesturing to where Celeriac was sitting. Briar blanched.  
"Sit down," Celeriac said softly, gazing upward at her son. Briar plopped down in a chair across from Celeriac, gulping audibly. Since there was only two chairs, Mari stood behind him.  
"We have much to talk about," Celeriac began, leaning into her hands.

Celeriac was actually quite good at explaining the whole situation. Briar listened with a mixture of fear and curiosity, laughing warmly when Celeriac mentioned Sans's love for science, frowning when she related Sans's capture.  
"Barbiturate?" Briar asked.  
"That's how we knew to contact you. Only your lab would adhere to such unethical procedures." Celeriac narrowed her eyes. Briar looked down guiltily.  
"This Sans you're talking about… he wouldn't happen to be a short African American youth, would he?" Thomas gulped. Mari and Celeriac shared a worried glance.  
"Yes. That's the exact description," Mari confirmed, nodding nervously.  
"Oh crap. They told me it- he couldn't feel pain. I didn't even use anesthetic. Even worse, the dissection is scheduled for tomorrow." Briar hugged his knees, shivering even though it was not cold. Mari felt her insides go cold. Tomorrow? How were they supposed to rescue Sans by tomorrow?  
"We need some way to enter the lab. Can you do that for us?" Celeriac asked, oozing with sincerity.  
"Yes. I'll give you visitor passes. Just bring Sans out of there by eight PM. I'm scheduled to give him the lethal injection then," Briar sobbed, horrified.  
"Great. Now, let's work out the rest of the plan." Mari began. They had a long night ahead of them.

* * *

 **Sorry for making Mari seem like a complete jerk. Here is (hopefully) some redemption. Please enjoy, and leave a comment! They really help me keep writing! :D**


	12. Chapter 12

_"So, have you observed this world's inherent corruption to its fullest extent? Do you understand now why I must destroy it?" Chara inquired, frustrated. Sans and Chara had returned once again in dreams to Chara's altered judgement hall. Sans was not standing proudly and defiantly like when he was there before. He was supporting himself against a pillar, barely holding himself up. Cherry blood dripped starkly against the ivory pillar, staunched only slightly by the makeshift bandage Sans had made of his scarlet scarf. The scientists had taken their agonizing toll "for the greater good."_

 _"yeah, yeah kid. same song and dance. i've heard it all before," Sans whispered bitterly._

 _"If you do not accept my help, you will certainly die," Chara pointed out._

 _"are you sick? you seem to be having a coffin fit," Sans made a weak pun, trying to avoid the subject of death in a slightly ironic manner. He stared down at his reflection in the polished floor. Tem, he looked so weak._

 _"Sans. Please, stop making puns and look at me," Chara pleaded. Wait, since when did Chara ever plead? Sans slowly lifted up his eyes to Chara's, wary of what he might see. Their shirt appeared to be flickering between lime green and sky blue at a tremendous speed, the stripes on their shirt becoming yellow, purple, yellow, purple, yellow. Their face was changing too, their smirk flickering into a neutral expression._

 _"We want to help," Frisk and Chara both said together in unison. Sans's mind reeled. This was not just Chara, but Charisk. Or Frisara, whatever you want to call them. Half of them was the child who led his brother to the glowing sun countless times, but half of them was the corrupt demon that had brutally slaughtered everyone he loved, cruelly ignoring their pleas for mercy. Sans reconsidered his choices._

 _"fine. i accept your help. now what the tem do i do?" Sans snapped, humiliated to be accepting help from a serial killer. Well, half a serial killer._

 _"Waking up would be a good start…"_

.

Sans drifted into consciousness in a small padded room that seemed straight out of an haunted insane asylum movie. The walls and floors were a harsh white, however, there were several large blood splotches around where Sans had been resting. Stupid scarlet scarf. It could not even bandage a wound properly. One beetle like camera glared from the ceiling corner, but it appeared to be off for the time being.

"Can you hear me?" Chara's voice echoed from nowhere is particular.

"loud and clear." Sans signed. His voice was still shot from all his screaming earlier, and his poorly bandaged side was acting up again. The scientists had taken tissue samples with a scalpel there, and it stung like wasp poison.

"Great! The password for the door is 211010." The soft voice of Frisk instructed. Sans dragged himself over to the keypad, liberally leaning on the the wall for support.

He reached the keypad, punching in the keys slowly, carefully, agonizingly. The small padded door slid open. Sans gaped.

"What? You thought we'd lie to you?" Chara said innocently.

.

Sans aimlessly stumbled around for a long while. The hallways were confusing, a twisting labyrinth of twirls and turns. Sans figured he had wandered for at least year. It felt like that.

"Turn left here!" Chara's voice called when Sans was at yet another intersection.

"I think we should turn right." Frisk's voice countered.

"if you don't know where you're going, just shut up!" Sans signed angrily at the two. He was sick of their bickering. It did not help at all, and they had been at it the whole time Sans was wandering.

"Hello? Is there anyone in this corridor?" An unknown voice called. The already unbalanced Sans stumbled backwards in surprise, falling onto the floor.

.

"Hello?" Sans saw a nervous looking man in a wheelchair approach, calling uncertainly. He was wearing a white lab coat like all the other scientists who hurt Sans, but his name tag read _inspector_ instead of _researcher_. His features were angular and sharp, almost elf like. He had messy shoulder length hair, and held himself with an air of dignity.

"Hel- oh!" The man backpedaled in surprise as soon as he caught sight of Sans. Sans tried to pull himself away, only to find his back to an ugly cream colored wall. He was trapped!

"Are you alright? You're bleeding!" The man asked. Sans scrabbled desperately at his magic stifling collar. Maybe if he removed it, he could teleport away to safety. The man inched forward.

"no," Sans signed desperately. No is a pretty universal word. Maybe, by some force of chance or fate, this enemy would know sign language?

"You speak sign language?" The man asked, surprised.

"yes," Sans signed back, slightly relieved.

"My name is Alex. Don't worry, I can help you. Stay still, I will call medical assistance," Alex assured like he was talking to a scared animal, reaching for his phone.

"no!" Sans signed with great force, shaking his head with vehemence. Alex looked mystified, but did not pull out his phone.

"Then… might I Iearn your name?" He asked.

"s a n s," Sans responded.

"Sans, we need call help. You desperately need medical attention!" Alex tried to convince Sans, looking greatly disturbed.

"He can be trusted," Frisk whispered discreetly in Sans's ear. Sans was suddenly grateful that Alex was not able to see or hear either Frisk or Chara.

"Do you hear that?" Alex asked Sans, suddenly falling silent. The sounds of a battle rang out faintly in the distance.

.

"Sans!" Sans saw Celeriac appear at the head of the hallway, calling.

"We were so worried about - who is this?" Celeriac asked warily when she caught sight of Alex.

"Ah, hello. I am Alex. Who might you be?" Alex responded amiably, sticking out his hand for Celeriac to shake.

"That doesn't matter," Mari said defensively, emerging from behind Celeriac. Mari and Celeriac were both wearing starched white lab coats complete with visitor badges. Mari had on a ridiculously oversized pair of glasses that made her look like a complete nerd. Celeriac did not even need the glasses to set off the nerd effect. Sans stiffened. What was Mari doing here? She had betrayed him, had she not?

"Trust me. Please." Mari signed to Sans discreetly. Given that Sans was collapsed against a wall, too weak to even stay awake much longer, he really did not think he had any choice in whom he trusted.

.

"What is going on here? I demand an explanation!" Alex yelled, the very air around him growing tense and frustrated. Mari and Celeriac both looked at each other and almost died laughing. It was just such a hopelessly idiotic situation.

"A very long story short, the guttersnipes here kidnapped Sans, and we're rescuing him." Mari gasped between bouts of debilitating laughter, wiping away tears. Sans decided to just go with that explanation.

"What? Are these accusations accurate, Sans?" Alex yelled, waving his arms around frantically.

"Yes," Sans signed weakly, eyelids drooping.

"What is he saying?" Celeriac whispered unintentionally loudly. "I don't know ASL."

A drumbeat of boots cut her off, echoing loudly into the cramped hallway.

"We should go," Mari said urgently, slinging Sans across her strong shoulders in a fireman's carry. At that very moment, an armed security guard appeared at the mouth of the hallway, loaded gun unholstered.

"Frack," Celeriac breathed.

.

"Hands above your head!" The guard commanded, brandishing his weapon violently. Sans was not familiar with the different makes and models of firearms yet, as they had no need for weapons in The Underground. Celeriac immediately surrendered, but Mari hesitated.

"I can't do that. I need to put him down first," she protested feebly.

The security guard practically screamed, "Well put him down, then!" Mari slowly and gently lowered Sans to the bumpy tiles.

"Where's Alex?" Celeriac whispered.

"Quiet!" The guard snapped. Sans realized then that Alex was missing. Had Alex ratted them out? Sans felt fear, pure, spellbinding, paralyzing fear. Would he have to go back to that maddening creamy white room, where the silence was deafening and no one ever slept? Even though Sans was only minutes away from his cell, he had already tasted freedom, and thirsted greatly for it.

.

"Ugh!" The guard cried out, flailing jerkily as the electricity flowed into them. They face planted to reveal a pale Alex holding a buzzing taser.

"I always knew I would have to use my taser someday," Alex said, grimacing, "Come on. We haven't all day." Mari picked up Sans again, and they began their long journey to freedom.

.

The rest of the trek out of the lab was uneventful, if you count tasering security guards, carjacking, and high speed car chases as uneventful. Not that Sans would know. He was unconscious for the whole time.

.

"Sans, are you awake?" Someone was shaking Sans's limp arm gently. He was lying somewhere fluffy, warm, comfortable, and most importantly, safe. Sans did not want to wake up under any circumstances.

"nope, i'm still sleeping," Sans mumbled, turning over.

"Cut the bull crap, comedian. This is important!" The voice of Chara screamed in his ear. Sans jerked awake to see Mari looming over him. Sans and Mari were in Celeriac's slightly rumpled house. Sans was lying on a blocky couch, ensconced by several blankets. He was wearing his violet hoodie, loosely fitting basketball shorts, and scarlet scarf, but someone had washed his. They had also bandaged him up quite well, but his wounded side still throbbed painfully. Mari began talking in a hushed tone, as if she was afraid her voice could impale Sans if she was not careful.

"Hey. The others are buying groceries, and I wanted to say something," Mari paused, taking a deep breath, "I'm sorry. What I did was certainly not right. Call me fickle, call me untrustworthy, but please, can you forgive me?"

"Forgive her. She was just doing what she thought was right," Frisk whispered in Sans's ear.

"Pfft, who'd want to forgive such a loser? She hurt you badly, Sans. She doesn't deserve forgiveness!" Chara countered. Sans thought over his choices for a long time. Mari turned to leave.

"mari," Sans called. She froze in her tracks.

"Yes?"

"um, i'm not quite ready to forgive," Sans started. Mari's eyes widened. "but i'm certainly willing to forget. let's just forget that ever happened, okay?" Mari's face broke into a relieved smile.

"Fine by me. Do you want to watch any TV?" Mari asked, pulling out Celeriac's neolithic TV remote.

"can we watch _attack of the flying mutant zombie robots_?" Sans asked, grinning.

"Do you even have to ask?"

.

About halfway through the movie, before the robots were mutated, but after they were zombified, Sans asked Mari a burning question of his.

"mari?"

"Yes, Sans?"

"did you tell celeriac and alex about our little scuffle? like, you working for the government?"

"…No."

"would you prefer me to not tell?"

"Definitely." Mari's answer came without hesitation.

"fine by me. a word of advice, kiddo. the longer you wait, the harder it gets. and the more people who will be really fracking mad with you when you tell them," Sans advised.

"Why did you call me 'kiddo'?" Mari gave Sans a puzzled look.

"it-it's nothing. you remind me of someone else who liked to keep secrets," Sans covered quickly. Chara giggled, while Frisk gave a quiet huff of annoyance.

.

"We arrive bearing groceries!" Alex announced regally from the doorway of Celeriac's home. Celeriac had set up a folding ramp to her front door for Alex. It was from the time her son had broken both his legs trying to skateboard stupidly across an extremely high precipice.

"Hey, Alex! How are you?" Mari asked, yawning sleepily.

"I am very well, thank you." Alex lit up, seeming to remember an idea. "If it is alright, may I have some time to converse with Sans?" Alex asked.

"Why?" Celeriac interrogated, scrunching her nose in suspicion.

"It is necessary to file an incident report. I am an inspector, after all. An account would be most helpful," Alex explained.

"Alright. If you hurt him in any way…" Celeriac leaned forward threateningly, her maternal instinct kicking in.

"I understand," Alex said, paling a little.

.

"Hello, Sans. How are you feeling?"

"better."

"I would like to ask you some questions about the circumstances of your captivity in Area 42. Every word you say will be recorded, and may be used as evidence. Is that alright?"

"yeah. fire away."

"Good. Why were you detained?"

"have you ever heard of the multiverse theory?"

"No. What is it?"

"say you have to choose between eating a slice of chocolate cake or a slice of coffee cake. the universe will split into two separate universes, one where you chose chocolate cake, and one where you ate a slice of coffee cake. both sides are completely unaware of the split, and a small change in choices can have a unexpected effect on the universe. my universe was changed from yours somehow. it is very different. like, chocolate and vanilla different. i'd go into more of the effects on space, but i'd need more time to planet."

"You're getting off topic. Anyways, you're from an alternate universe?"

"yup. you also have no sense of humor."

"Hey, I do! It's just more sophisticated than your terrible puns. On a more on track note, no wonder the researchers wanted to run tests."

"the tests were unethical, and i'm guessing that they were illegal. they could have at least drugged me for the less fun parts."

"Very true. What was your universe like? How was it different?"

"there was a completely different race called monsters that lived side by side with humans. there was a war, and monsters were banished underneath mount ebbot. monsters ended up being freed by a multiverse jumping ten year old who then tried to kill everyone."

"Interesting. However, there is no place in the world called Mount Ebbot. I would know, I was a high school geography champion. Were you originally a human?"

"no. i was a species of monster known as skeletons. i changed into a human somehow in the transition between universes."

"Well, that is quite the tale. How did you arrive from your universe to this one?"

"i was banished to the void for disobeying one of the unbreakable rules of my universe, the script. mari and celeriac built a machine, which from what i can tell, was not even supposed to work. They call the machine the error toaster. it sucked me into this universe, along with another, less than nice citizen of my world. luckily, they're in the void again."

"What is the void?"

"the space between universes. you don't want to be there under any circumstances. can i ask you a question?"

"Sure!"

"do you actually believe what i am saying?"

"It's… a little far fetched, I must admit. However, the testing procedures were undeniably unorthodox, and i will do anything in my power to prevent you from returning there."

"thank you. how long was i out?"

"One full day. You're quite the heavy sleeper," Alex chuckled, ruffling Sans's hair. "You also missed one very long car ride. I envy you for that. Your friends have quite the repertoire of bad jokes."

"Dinner's ready!" Mari called from the kitchen, right on cue.

"Come on. Let's eat some supper. You must be famished after so long!" Sans's growling stomach realized that Alex was right.

* * *

 **Hiya! I just wanted to say this, if I offend you in ANY WAY, please PM me, and I will change it ASAP. Hope you enjoyed the chapter! Hopefully that was enough redemption for Mari. Frisk and Chara join the gang! (That was for you, Guest. Your comment made me laugh.) :) Anyways, have a nice day! See you guys next Sunday!**


	13. Chapter 13

"Alex, do you have any siblings?" Celeriac asked conversationally, passing a plate of roasted beets. Mari, Sans, Celeriac, and Alex were chatting at the table, eating dinner together. Celeriac had made a salad, but Mari was a complete sugar addict. Luckily, there was plenty of creamy Italian dressing to go around.

.

"Yes. I have a brother. He's sort of odd; he refuses to be called by any name other than Sprog. He is a used car salesman." Alex explained causally. Mari nearly choked on her salad, bursting into a mess of coughing. Little slimy lettuce bits coated the table in front of her, causing a chorus of "ewwww"s. Sans made an disgusted face, while Celeriac looked concerned.

"Are you okay?" Celeriac asked, patting Mari's back.

"Ye-" Mari broke into another fit of coughs, "I'm fine. Food just went down the wrong way." Mari lied raspily. Alex was the brother of a fracking creep of a mob boss? Mari filed that information in the back of her head. If Sprog turned on her, maybe she could hold Alex hostage. She was never very proud of this type of thoughts. However, they had kept Mari breathing and sane in the past.

.

Sans spoke up at the end of a heated debate about which was better: Star Trek or Star Wars.

"um, is there anyway to remove this?" Sans gestured to his collar. Alex stared at him blankly for a second, uncomprehending.

"Oh! Sorry, I sort of forgot," Celeriac said, rubbing the back of her head sheepishly, "Yeah, I could remove it. I have the equipment needed in my lab."

Alex turned to face Celeriac.

"What was this collar used for?" He inquired, swishing the words around in his mouth like he bit into horseradish.

"It's nothing! Just vitals, and maybe, um, tracking. Anyways it would be best to take it off - to take it off as soon as possible," Celeriac blustered a little too quickly. Alex frowned.

"Who made this collar?" He asked.

"I did, but…" Celeriac trailed off. The light in her eyes alerted Mari that she had reached the inevitable conclusion.

"I gave it to Mari," Celeriac finished.

.

The whole table grew tense and deathly still.

"Mari? What's going on?" Alex asked. Mari stared down at her hands, silent. Celeriac was frozen in shock. Sans interjected, tugging on his collar nervously.

"i think now would be a good time to tell them." Mari looked up, her eyes resting on Sans.

"Okay," She began.

.

"I was a secret agent for the government, sent to watch Celeriac. Once Sans was summoned, I was tasked to apprehend him. Afterwards, I felt bad and rescued him," Mari explained, speaking so fast that her words were nearly unintelligible.

"Wait - so you believe this kid's fairy tale too?" Alex groaned.

"Yes. It's rather hard to forget what happened," Celeriac assured.

"Absolutely peachy. In one day I get a messed up time traveler, a mad scientist, and now, some sort of James Bond. What next? A space unicorn destroys Sears Tower?" Alex buried his head in his hands.

"hey, if you stuck mari underwater she would be," Sans gave a crap eating grin.

"No!" Alex shouted.

"james pond!" Sans winked. Alex raged, nearly falling out of his seat. Sans nearly fell out of his seat too, except it was because he was laughing so hard.

"I must admit, this is a - surprise. However, Sans is the one with the most reason to be mad at you, but he seems to have forgiven you. I'll let this one slide too," Celeriac decided, shrugging.

"He hasn't forgiven me just yet," Mari chuckled, taking a bite of her hot sauce drenched salad. That was certainly Sans's work. Luckily for Mari, she had taste buds of fracking titanium.

"all teeth rotting fluff aside, can we please just get this stupid collar off?"

.

Alex said his heartfelt goodbyes after dinner, and the three left headed to the lab to remove the offending collar.

"Ready to head in?" Celeriac asked, removing a key from a ring of at least one hundred keys.

"heck. yes," Sans announced, "i want this dog collar off me asap."

"Great," Mari said automatically. Celeriac unlocked the door. It swung open with a ominous creak, resting in an ajar position.

"Hi Mari! It's nice to see you here!" Thomas greeted the trio amicably, waving.

.

"Who are you, and what are you doing in my office?" Celeriac yelled, stunned, after a tense second of silence. The error toaster was dragged into the center of Celeriac's office. One window was thrown open, where Thomas had presumably scaled the outside wall into the office. Notes were scattered all over, organized into unknown categories. Some notes lay discarded in a corner, while a select few vied for attention, annotated messily in Thomas's scrawled script.

"I'm saving the world, professor," Thomas announced, his gaze darkening, "What, aren't you proud of me?"

.

"saving the world?" Sans repeated, shivering.

"I will use Professor Celeriac's ingenious device to summon myself a soldier, one that will obey my orders, unlike you, weakling," Thomas spat.

"You'll take over the world. How original. It's not like every single villain tried to do that," Mari retorted.

Thomas smiled smugly, launching into a speech.

"I am not a villain. I am a hero! I will rule much better than those idiots in charge. Imagine: a world without hunger, without poverty, without fear, without death!"

.

Celeriac gazed at Thomas, her eyes piercing through his butter armor of righteousness.

"I don't know you. I don't even know you name. However, I think I know enough to advise you on this," Celeriac spoke carefully, letting silence punctuate her words better than any comma.

"Don't repeat my mistakes. Go home. The world will be bettered by your inaction."

.

Thomas laughed quietly, slowly but painfully building into insane bouts of howling.

"I idealized you! The great Professor Celeriac! Builder of a brighter beginning! Don't you understand? This is for the greater good! Yet you reject me, betray me!" Thomas screeched, his face contorting into something twisted, demented, tortured.

"what will you do if they don't obey you?" Sans asked timidly, shying away from the growing shadow of hate Thomas was casting.

"I'll just kill them and summon another slave. Progress won't wait, will it?" Thomas whispered. He pulled the lever, starting up the error toaster.

.

Meanwhile, Mari had slipped away to a dusty storage cabinet. She sneezed twice, pulling out her phone and dialing frantically. It rang once, twice, and then thankfully someone picked up.

"This is Sprog's used automobile metropolis, how can I help-" Mari cut Sprog off hastily.

"Sprog, this is Mari. I need your help. There's a gigantic lunatic trying to take over the world, and backup would be helpful. Very helpful."

"Of course. I assume you will pay for it?" Sprog said in a calm, smooth voice.

"How?" Mari asked, suddenly nervous.

"Information," Sprog answered. Information Mari could do. She had been hoarding information her whole life. Mari responded unhesitatingly.

"Deal."

"Great. I'll send some of my best people right over."

* * *

 **Happy New Years! 2017! *cheers* This is from Mari's perspective, and she isn't able to hear Frisk or Chara, so they're not includeded. Sorry. This is wrapping up! Sorry I didn't post last week. Christmas. Enough said. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Have a nice day, and please comment!**


	14. Chapter 14

The error toaster crackled wildly, throwing frenzied tendrils of electricity across Celeriac's office. Papers started swirling around Celeriac's office as if they were in the center of a tornado, giving the room an otherworldly feel.

.

"Come on, I just cleaned this!" Celeriac complained frustratedly. Thomas stepped back as she spoke, twisted joy lighting up his features. He held his arms out, a maestro of the strange symphony.

"Come out, my pretty," he crooned, "Come out and serve me!" With an ear shattering explosion, a hulking creature began pulling itself out of the whirling vortex.

.

Sans blanched. He looked up, down, left, and right. Yup, this was definitely Omega Flowey. Tem, he was so dust.

"Sans, you need to fight!" Chara ordered.

"I'm afraid that they're right," Frisk whispered timidly. Sans blinked. If Frisk said he needed to fight, than he definitely needed to fight.

"celeriac, i need you to remove my collar," Sans breathed, sweat beading on his forehead.

"What? That could be dangerous!" Celeriac objected.

"Does this thing look tame to you?" Sans gestured frantically to the rapidly emerging Omega Flowey.

"Back corner. I have the equipment there," Celeriac directed, diving towards a discarded pile of machinery. Sans sprinted as fast as he could towards Celeriac, dodging papers, flying marbles, - why did Celeriac have marbles in her office anyway? - and the occasional thrashing vine. He was almost there; just three more feet!

"Sans, move!" Chara cried out urgently. Sans looked up to see a gleaming Flowey Bomb flying straight towards him. He had no time to duck or move in any way. Aaron's pectorals, this was bad.

.

Boom! Sans heard a loud explosion, and felt a wave of searing heat. He checked himself. Nope, he was not dead. Not yet. His chances of surviving had dropped considerably in the last five minutes, however.

"Kid, you okay?" A voice cried out in the chaos. Sans looked over to see a man gripping an absurdly large rifle, still smoking from where he had shot the bomb.

"who the tem are you?" Sans politely replied. Sprog tsked.

"So ungrateful. Mar called us in. That's all you need to know," Sprog explained, gesturing to five people behind him. Each looked like a standard businessperson, but they held varying degrees of weaponry, ranging from double katanas to a machine gun.

"His can be trusted for the time being," Frisk whispered.

"Watch your back, though," Chara finished gravely.

.

Sprog's team was terrifyingly effective. They contained the thrashing vines with difficulty, jumping and dodging vines and bombs while finding the being's weak spot, but of off switch of the error toaster was still unreachable.

"Sans!" Celeriac called. She was cowering in a secluded corner of her office with a large pile of machinery strewn around her.

"Over here! I have the equipment set up!" Sans once again started toward Celeriac, albeit more successfully this time. Once Sans made it over, Celeriac removed a tiny metallic key from a tightly sealed box.

"Alright, this won't hurt a bit," Celeriac reassured. Sans tensed. People always said that when it would hurt.

"It's off," Frisk pointed out. Sans felt his neck. The hated collar was was off. It really had not hurt a bit. Celeriac took in his surprised expression.

"What? You really thought I was lying?" She said, feigning offense.

"hey, i'm just glad to have it off. wearing a dog collar is a bit ruff," Sans joked, ignoring the hectic situation around them. Bullets shot rang out, only deafened by the sound of glass shattering and walls crumbling. They were lucky the ceiling had not caved in yet.

"Good one, wise guy." Celeriac ruffled Sans's hair while he protested.

"Now, is there anything you can do about the cow dog vine monster?" Celeriac asked.

"yes. yes there is," Sans said, summoning an inescapable barrage of gleaming bones.

.

Sans's bone attack hit Omega Flowey right on the weird TV face thing, stopping them from hitting a member of Sprog's team.

"Sans? What is that?" Mari shouted, referring to Sans's bone attack. She must have entered the office when Sans was having his collar removed.

"i'm fighting this thing!" Sans yelled back, narrowly dodging a thorny vine. With a snap of his fingers, he summoned his Gaster Blasters.

"heya einstein, edison, mendel, curie, franklin, and last but certainly not least, mcclintock. it's good to see you again," Sans greeted his Gaster Blasters affectionately, patting each on their canine head.

"You IDIOTS!" Omega Flowey screeched angrily.

"shut up," Sans dismissed Omega Flowey with a large blast from Franklin. It was good to have magic again.

.

"Sans, look! Is he crazy?" Chara shouted, mentally pointing Sans to where Thomas stood. Whoops. Sans had forgotten about the wacko in all of the chaos.

"Being! Serve me!" Thomas commanded desperately. Omega Flowey stopped. They looked down, towering over Thomas. Time froze.

"Why SHOULD I?" Flowey responded, giggling.

"I summoned you, and you shall obey me!" Thomas raged hopelessly, futilely, not noticing the many people around him.

"You BELIEVE that? You really ARE a sicko," Flowey oozed venomously. Thomas's face turned to confusion, then to shock, then to pure terror.

"DIE." Flowey growled, launching a bouquet of thorny vines at Thomas SOUL. Sans was paralyzed, both Chara and Frisk were screaming their nonexistent heads off at him, Celeriac and Mari were cowering in the corner, and Sprog's team was peppering Omega Flowey with as many bullets as possible, but to no avail. Omega Flowey yanked out a SOUL from Thomas's chest, almost blinding with the purity of its sea blue. They laughed maniacally, beginning the absorption process. The world shook, vibrating more intensely with each passing second, seeming to fall apart and break-

.

"Finally. I was so tired of being a flower," Asriel smiled, relieved.

"Howdy! Sans, are you there? It's me, your good friend."

.

 **R**

.

It's the end.

* * *

 **Hiya! Sans's Gaster Blasters are all named after prominent physicists, geneticists, and inventors. They are Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Gregor Mendel, Marie Curie, Rosalind Franklin, and Barbara McClintock. Have a nice day, and please leave a comment! *makes puppy eyes***


	15. Chapter 15

**Warning: possibly triggering material. Mentions of gun violence and death.**

* * *

Mari ducked as Asriel threw one of their gleaming swords at Mari. Her breath hitched in her throat as the blade hissed a millimeter above her head, slicing a few strands of hair clean off.

"h-hey asriel, calm d-down. what do you wa-want?" Sans stuttered, sweating profusely. Asriel cocked his head to one side. The room was in a state of complete disorder. Rubble was strewn everywhere, and there was holes scattered randomly in the floor. Mari felt bad for the people on the floor beneath them. The whole room was silent, as if they whole room was holding it's breath. Then, a cry broke the silence.

"Fracking son of a birch! I'll fill your ugly carcass with bullet holes!" Sprog howled and charged. His team followed, fearlessly engaging in battle with Asriel.

 **.**

"What is that thing?" Mari asked Sans, awed. Asriel was successfully defending against five heavily armed, trained fighters with only a sword.

"That's Asriel. I was friends with him as a child and…" Sans trailed off.

"And what?" Mari felt like she was missing a very crucial piece of information.

"they're dead!" Sans exclaimed.

 **.**

"What?" Mari exclaimed in shock.

"i saw them dust!" Sans yelled frustratedly. He subconsciously reached for his scarlet scarf, stroking it.

"What do they want?" Mari nearly shouted back, stressed. Anyone would be stressed if a giant, hostile, magic, sword wielding goat randomly appeared at their work.

"I don't know what the tem they want! They've been dead for years!" Sans huffed. A crash resounded deafeningly throughout the office, shaking the floor and sending Mari and Sans off balance. The fire alarm went off, flashing and beeping. Mari glanced over to see how Sprog was doing.

"Frack," She cursed.

 **.**

Sprog's team was sprawled out on the ground, either unconscious or dead. Mari really hoped they were not dead. Asriel towered over a kneeling Sprog, iridescent sword dripping with blood.

"How curious. You appear to have some semblance of power. I respect that," Asriel addressed Sprog, licking their fangs.

"Hey! Back off!" Mari growled, pulling out a small gun. Sans charged his - dragon skull guns? Mari did not know what to call them. Asriel put his iridescent blade against Sprog's neck, drawing a thin line of blood. Sprog's eyes widened in fear.

"If you fire your Gaster Blasters, Sans, I'm afraid your acquaintance will be no more," Asriel threatened. The sheer nonchalance in which they threatened to kill Sprog was far more terrifying than the actual threat. Sans dissipated his blasters, shoulders drooping.

"what do you want?" Mari asked, holstering her gun.

"I want Sans to return. He does not belong in this world," Asriel said.

 **.**

Celeriac stood up slowly in response from her sheltered little corner, hesitantly approaching Asriel. Her normally professional suit was rumpled, giving her a sharp contrast to Asriel, whose robe was strangely immaculate. There was not a speck of dust or a shard of glass on Asriel's robe, even as papers and dust swirled around them.

"Oh? And you are?" Asriel sneered, a rainbow orb of uncanny flame in one hand, a sharp blade pressed to Sprog's neck in the other.

"I'm just a concerned bystander," Celeriac said, shrugging.

"Go home, bystander. You do not deserve the death I shall impart upon you if you stay," Asriel growled, baring his fangs. The orb of light in his hands grew even brighter, illuminating Asriel and Celeriac's faces. Mari and Sans observed from a safe distance, afraid of invoking Asriel's wrath.

"We could sit down and work this out. Just release the person you're holding, and we could settle this over some nice hot cocoa." Celeriac pleaded, holding her hands up in the universal gesture of calm-the-frack-down-I'm-not-armed. Asriel paused, slightly relaxing his grip on his sword. The sphere of rainbow light dimmed, then grew almost blinding seconds later.

"Do you know the pain I have been through?" Asriel snarled, "Have you experienced the torture I have endured time and time again, just waiting for salvation?" Celeriac face grew contorted with each word, slowly becoming darker and darker.

"Do you even know what it is like to lose hope, to lose everything? Of course you don't! You're weak!" Asriel laughed long and hard. His grip on the sword tightened so much that his hand trembled, causing Sprog's face to contort with fear. However, Celeriac's expression was the most fearsome of all. Shadows collected around her eyes, which were radiating pure, unbridled fury.

"Shut up, beast! I know torment more than any of you!" Celeriac roared, abandoning all pretense of pacifism.

"So tell me! How much have you endured? Did you spill your ice cream, little child? How sad!" For a second time, Asriel laughed.

 **.**

Celeriac's hands clenched open and closed. Her breath became ragged and hitched.

"Have you seen your child die before your eyes?" She screamed. Asriel seemed to find this even more hilarious. Celeriac hurled each word at Asriel as if they were bullets.

"Aden was a good child! She didn't deserve what happened!"

"And what did happen?" Asriel's disposition switched quickly, as he asked slowly, dangerously, leaning backward. Sprog whimpered softly as the motion caused the blade to bite a little more into his neck.

"Tell me or he dies." Asriel threatened.

"She was in an accident," Celeriac's voice grew shaky with emotion, "My little Aden went to a police officer for help, and of course she had to get the most trigger happy cop in the whole fracking police force!"

"Satisfy my curiosity. What was she like?" Asriel inquired.

"W-what was she like?" Celeriac asked, puzzled.

 **.**

"Um, she was pretty lazy. She could sleep all day if she could." Celeriac paused, staring off into space.

"Go on," Asriel prompted.

"She like jokes of any type - especially puns. She had a weird liking for condiments. She also enjoyed terrible movies," Celeriac said softly, her head hanging. Mari was shocked. She had thought she was good at keeping secrets.

"Her favorite was _Attack of the Flying Mutant Zombie Robot Ninja Gorillas_. She really liked science too, although you wouldn't know it from how she acted," Celeriac was just reminiscing at this point.

"Oh? Does this remind you of anyone?" Asriel prompted, shaking his head.

"You are not taking Sans from me. I lost one child; I am not losing another!" Celeriac proclaimed defiantly. She pulled a shard of sharpened metal from her belt, brandishing it like a knife. Mari could practically see the bloodlust congelating, shrouding the knife in warm energy.

"Celeriac, no!" Sans shouted, bounding forward, arm outstretched.

"Die!" Celeriac cried, stabbing Asriel in the neck. Asriel never even had a chance to react. Their blade clattered to the the ground, releasing Sprog. The orb of rainbow flame died out, and the only light source in the dilapidated office was a soft stream of golden light coming in from a whole in the wall. It fell on Asriel, and for a second, they seemed to be made of pure gold.

 **.**

*Asriel Dremurr

Atk: ∞

Def: ∞

HP: 0

*It really is the end. At least for them it is.

 **.**

Asriel is using "Hyper Goner."

 **.**

A gigantic skull appeared in the middle of the room, creating a vacuum pulling everything in towards it. Mari grabbed onto a desk next to her, holding on for dear life. The sheer force of the vacuum was astounding, pulling Mari off her feet. If she was not holding onto the desk, she would have been sucked into whatever was in that skull. Mari did not want to find out. The force built and built until Mari felt she could hold on no longer. Then, it just stopped. The skull disappeared. Mari collapsed onto the floor, panting with exhaustion. Nothing remained of Asriel Dremurr except a couple floating dust molecules.

"Is everyone okay?" Mari groaned.

"I'm okay," Sprog said. He was laying on the floor, still holding onto the loose floorboard that had saved him.

"Here," Sprog's team chorused in near perfect unison, as they all had conveniently grabbed onto something sturdy even though they were just unconscious to make it easier for the author.

"I'm alive," Celeriac mumbled, clutching her dusty piece of metal. She had managed to stay out of the void through… sheer will power. That woman never ceased to amaze Mari, whether killing an absolute god of hyperdeath or messing up curry. Seriously, how does one mess up curry?

"Where's Sans?" Celeriac asked.

 **.**

The room went silent. It seemed he had not been so lucky.

* * *

 **Note: I know Asriel is implied to be male in game, but I personally like them bring non binary. Tem isn't a god, I just was trying to think of non-vulgar swear words for Sans. It's sorta hard to do that. Like, human swear words are easy, but what would a monster say? If you think of one, leave it in the comment please! The next (also the last) chapter will take much longer than a week, because it will probably be very long. Have a nice day, and beware of impending rainbow unicorns barfing candy!**


	16. Chapter 16

The void is frigid. It always has been so, and always will be. Being in the void, therefore, is akin to being in a refrigerator.

In Sans's most eloquent words, it sucked. Big time.

"hello? is anyone there?" Sans called out desperately into the vacancy surrounding him.

*But nobody came.

At least the void was less painful than last time. The darkness around him was not like knives, but watery, even if it was freezing. Sans pulled his violet hoodie tighter around him, shivering.

"Sans? Can you hear us?" Chara asked hesitantly.  
"yes!" Sans yelled, overcome with emotion, He nearly wept with joy at not being alone. Sans knew it was selfish to want someone to suffer with him, but as the proverb says, misery loves company.  
"how did you guys get in here?" Sans asked, tilting his head.  
"We're part of you now, remember?" Frisk said softly.  
"heh. if it wasn't this cold, I would say this void was pretty ice," Sans joked, making his own drum sounds immediately after.  
"Sans! That was terrible!" Chara groaned.  
"so snow more puns?" Sans's grin was halfway to the top of his head by now.  
"Okay, you really need to chill out," Chara retorted, "but we do have some good news."

"I think we can get you out of the void," Frisk announced happily.  
"really?" Sans asked. If he was in an anime, his eyes would have popped five feet out of his eye sockets.  
"That error toaster thing is a piece of crap, and we all know it. Sans literally made a better version of it in his backyard," Chara huffed.  
"kid, my machine broke after only two uses, and now i can't fix it," Sans refuted. His machine was far more cruddy than the error toaster. Sure, the error toaster destroyed a bit of the environment around it, but at least it actually worked.  
"What's even better? I can send you back home to the Undertale universe!" Chara triumphantly crowed.

"No!" Frisk shouted, which was completely out of character for the normally quiet Frisk. Sans had never heard Frisk even raise their voice above mildly concerned before.  
"frisk? what's wrong?" Sans asked, concerned. He instinctively turned as if he was shifting his focus to another person, except no one was there.  
"Th-they'll destroy i-it. All of it," Frisk stuttered. If Frisk was corporal, Sans knew she would be shivering.  
"who will destroy what?" Sans asked. He was beginning to be unnerved by Frisk's panicked tone.  
"Chara. They'll annihilate the world you were just in," Frisk whispered, barely audible.

"So what? All they've done is hurt you. We made a bargain Sans, don't you remember? Don't you want to go home?" Chara argued.  
"couldn't you just leave mari's world alone, and i could go home?" Sans pleaded, feeling foolish at talking to empty space.  
"No can do. Your universe is far away, so the only way I can reach it is by harvesting energy from other universes. The only one I can reach at the moment is the one you were just in. Unless you want to wait in the void for another five years, of course," Chara explained lazily, mentally leaning back in a nonexistent seat.

"If they do that, this world will be destroyed!" Frisk screamed, causing Sans's head to throb.  
"jeez. quiet down a little, kiddo, okay?" Sans winced, massaging his temples. He stretched out a little, working out a few kinks in his back.  
"Sorry," Frisk reverted back to their normal voice, which was soft and melodic. Sans relaxed a bit at the welcome change.  
"Think about it. Do you really want millions of lives to end? Yes, some of them tried to dissect you, but there are good people there too!" Frisk begged Sans. Glassy tears formed in their spiritual eyes, floating off into a starless space.

"Sans," Chara's voice was not its usual boisterous tone, but a small voice used but for only the most intimate of conversations, of secrets whispered behind a shielding hand and hushed tones over stacks of dusty books.  
"Your brother misses you," Chara whispered. Sans's vibrant eyes snapped open. His hand flew up to the soft scarlet scarf still wound around his neck.  
"Papyrus is grieving for the brother he thinks is dead, but everyone thinks Papyrus is crazy. They don't even remember you, Sans," Chara confided.  
"what else?" Sans choked out, fists clenching. His brother was the coolest. Papyrus did not deserve that fate.  
"The world is broken and falling apart without you. The capital has fallen into an abyss, along with Asgore and the thousands of monsters living there. The volcano under Hotland has erupted, immolating Alphys and Mettaton. Waterfall violently flooded, causing a cave in that crushed Undyne and Monster Kid. Grillby and the K-9 unit perished in a perilous Snowdin snowstorm," Chara recounted grimly. Sans felt tears pricking his eyes as he heard the fate of his homeland. This was much worse than a measly genocide run. Sure, genocide runs were bad, but at least his friends Grillby and Alphys survived, along with the monsters who had the common sense to hide.  
"and papyrus? what about him?" Sans asked, his stomach sinking as if it was filled with lead in anticipation.

"Papyrus took shelter with Toriel in the ruins. He's okay, although they're slowly running out of food," Chara assured. Sans sighed in relief, his blue eye light fading. He had not realized he was in a state of hyper vigilance until he relaxed.  
"why didn't you just reset?" He asked, a horrible curiosity worming its way into his head.  
"We couldn't. Without you, the reset just… broke," Frisk said sadly.  
"I located you through your dreams, and Frisk provided the energy to warp here, for lack of a better term," Chara explained.

"Well, I think we explained enough," Frisk said, borrowing energy from Sans. It was a direct drain to him, and he felt fatigued all of a sudden.  
"Choose," Chara commanded.

Frisk and Chara appeared in the inky darkness of the void. Chara was standing in front of Sans to his left, and Frisk was in front of him to his right. Both seemed to shimmer, almost like a hologram.

"Sans, billions of people will die if you go home. The underground has hope to live on without you. You may not be happy, but everyone will be alive. Come with me." Frisk held out her soft hands out, unmarried by a single weapon. A fiery halo of sea blue and muted purple formed behind her head.

"Sans, I can save your friends and family from a terrible fate. I'll give up my runs. We can be happy on the surface. Come with me." Chara reached her calloused hand out to Sans, and a glowing halo of swirling deep green with sparks of bright yellow formed behind her silky hair.

 **Note: to go with Chara, go to the next chapter. To choose Frisk, use the chapter index and select the last chapter.**

* * *

The thesaurus is my best friend.


	17. Chara's Ending

Sans stepped towards Chara before he could convince himself otherwise.

"i'm going to see papyrus again." He said with conviction, clenching his fist.  
"Good choice," Chara congratulated with a toothy smile.

Frisk's radiant halo dissipated into dust.  
"…Okay." Was Frisk's response to Sans's decision. The sheer disappointment on their face was painfully clear. There was no anger, no sadness, nothing was present but an overwhelming feeling that he had failed Frisk.

"Ready? I'm going to teleport you now," Chara said, holding out their hands for Sans to take them. Sans took their outstretched hands, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.  
Let's nightcore this botch!" Chara whooped. Sans had his eyes closed, but he felt the void around him shudder a little.  
"Three steps forward," Chara ordered, and Sans followed. Suddenly, the cold feeling around him turned to warmth.

"Sans, is that you?" Papyrus asked in disbelief. Sans opened his eyes to see a warmly familiar skeleton stand over him. Sans teared up until all he could do was nod. His grin morphed into an actual smile, unlike the one he usually wore.  
"I knew it! I'm not crazy!" Papyrus exclaimed jubilantly, scooping Sans into a hug.

The next year was a blur. Charisk was able to get Sans, Papyrus, Toriel, and the surviving monsters to the surface.  
"No more resets," they had said, "from either of us." Shortly after that, Charisk had disappeared, to the mourning of Toriel. The humans had been accepting of the monsters, mostly due to their dwindling population size. Sans attended a local university to receive a physics degree, which he ended up receiving in six months instead of the usual four years. Toriel opened a school, which Sans ended up teaching in because young humans tended to be creeped out by a talking skeleton. Papyrus became the official mascot of the monsters, helping to establish peaceful relationships with human governments through his sheer cluelessness.

"hey tori! what type of pasta noodle do you want?" Sans called to Toriel, who was picking out pasta sauces. She seemed distant.  
"Huh?" Toriel asked, snapping out of it.  
"pasta noodles?" Sans asked, annunciating each syllable.  
"Oh! Tortellini would be nice, Sans," Toriel answered. Sans picked two boxes of cheap tortellini of the shelf, throwing them into the shopping cart.

Bang! Sans collapsed to the linoleum floor without warning.  
"Sans? Are you alright?" Toriel asked, glancing over. She did a double take at the prone skeleton.  
"Sans!" Toriel rushed over. Her face was the last thing Sans saw before the world faded to black.

Sans was back in the void, looking down at two TV screen like objects. One displayed him, collapsed on the floor at a supermarket, and the other displayed him with Mari and Celeriac. Both versions of him were unconscious, a product of different choices.

But why was Sans seeing his other self?

Wasn't that a little paradoxical?

* * *

Welp, shortest chapter yet! Also the end. Thanks for sticking with me this whole time! It's been one heck of a journey writing this! Have a nice day, and beware of the man who speaks in hands! \\(0U0)/


	18. Frisk's Ending

Sans stepped towards Frisk before he could convince himself otherwise.  
"i'm not going to let all those people die," He said with conviction, lowering his gaze.  
"Thanks," Frisk whispered with a gentle smile. Chara glared at him, their radiant halo dissipating into dust.  
"You son of a goat licker! Don't you want to be happy?" Was Chara's response. The anger on their face was so pure it was almost glowing. Sans hurried towards Frisk, glancing nervously at Chara.

"Ready? I'm going to teleport you now," Frisk said, holding out their hands for Sans to take them. Sans took their outstretched hands, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.  
"Chara and I will head back to the Undertale world. We can at least help a little," Frisk consoled. Sans had his eyes closed, but he felt the void around him shudder a little.  
"Three steps forward," Frisk ordered, and Sans followed. Suddenly, the icy cold feeling around him turned to tingly warmth.

"Sans, is that you?" Mari asked in disbelief. Sans opened his eyes to see a familiar human standing over him. Sans teared up until all he could do was nod. His grin fell a little.  
Thank goodness! You're alright!" Mari exclaimed jubilantly, scooping Sans into a hug.

The next year was a blur. Celeriac was able to register Sans in a local high school, given how young he looked.  
"You can stay with me," they had said, "until you want to leave." Sans knew he was just a replacement for a dead girl, but Celeriac was a nice person, and he really needed the help. Mari continued her line of work in the government, but Thomas was no longer her boss, as he was dead as a doorknob. Mari, Celeriac, and Sprog passed the whole Asriel incident off as a freak gas leak. Sprog continued his work in the used car business, and Alex was convinced to rescind his report.

"hey celeriac! what type of pasta noodle do you want?" Sans called to Celeriac, who was picking out pasta sauces. She seemed distant.  
"Huh?" Celeriac asked, snapping out of it.  
"pasta noodles?" Sans asked, annunciating each syllable.  
"Oh! Tortellini would be nice, Sans," Celeriac answered. Sans picked two boxes of cheap tortellini of the shelf, throwing them into the shopping cart.

Thud! Sans collapsed to the linoleum floor without warning.  
"Sans? Are you alright?" Celeriac asked, glancing over. She did a double take at the prone skeleton.  
"Sans!" Celeriac rushed over. Her face was the last thing Sans saw before the world faded to black.

Sans was back in the void, looking down at two TV screen like objects. One displayed him, collapsed on the floor at a supermarket, and the other displayed him with Toriel. Both versions of him were unconscious, a product of different choices.

But why was Sans seeing his other self?

Wasn't that a little paradoxical?

* * *

Wow, this story has been one heck of a journey! Thanks you all you peoples who stuck with it until the end! Have a nice day, and beware of the man who came from another world! \\(0U0)/


End file.
